Paladin Squadron
by TellersPhantomAce
Summary: After an alien ship crashes into the jungles of Sotoa and blows open a year-old mystery, five pilots from four different nations accidentally plunge themselves and Strangereal into a war that spans the universe, and must seize victory from the jaws of defeat, like they always do. Rated T for language and explosions, ships currently undecided but this will probably change.
1. Prologue: Space Oddity

**AN:** Hello all, and welcome to my fanfiction! So yes, this is the first fanfiction idea I've had that I could be driven to put down into writing in years. As you can tell from the words above, this is an Ace Combat and Voltron: Legendary Defender crossover, with the human portion of the Space Fam being from Ace Combat's native world of Strangereal, specifically in roughly the same time period as the (simulated) events of Ace Combat 3

 **disclaimer:** is that all?

 **AN:** No, I hope you all enjoy reading this story. Take it away, Disclaimer.

 **disclaimer:** Good enough. Ace Combat is property of Project Aces and Bandai Namco Entertainment, Inc; Voltron: Legendary Defender is property of DreamWorks Animation, WEP, and Studio Mir. The author owns none of these companies.

* * *

 **Kerberos, 2nd Moon of 134340 Pluto**

 **June 22, 2040**

 **09:00 UCT**

 _All right, Belka, judging by our calculations you should be just about in the gravity well of Kerberos, so you may begin your descent at your leisure, Shiro._

The short, arrowhead-shaped _Belka_ had been in orbit around Pluto's fourth-discovered and second-largest moon for the better part of fifteen minutes, its nuclear lightbulb engine sitting at idle, its pilot and passengers feeling a strange mix of boredom and unspeakable excitement. Mars is one thing. Pluto? Pluto is entirely different. On Mars you can _see_ Earth, and on Earth you can see Mars, both with the naked eye. It took 7 million years of evolution and a 61-centimeter telescope to even _find_ Pluto.

 _Understood, Basset Control. I'm putting the lander down._

The lander was an interesting vehicle in that it didn't feature a space buggy, it _was_ the space buggy - it would fly down, land on a sufficiently smooth part of the Kerberian surface, then pop out its wheels to lift itself off the ground. Then, when they needed to return home, it'd extend the stabilizers into the ground, fire up the engines, and fly back up to the _Belka_ , leaving its rolling chassis behind. A similar design had been used on the Moon and Mars - the Kerberan lander was just smaller and lighter.

"Showtime, Shiro. You ready for this?"

Samuel Holt, a Belkan scientist, was the 'commanding officer' (so to speak) of the mission. The lead scientist, at least. Also the oldest. Shiro was the pilot and other scientist, and Matthew Holt was the engineer and other scientist. They were here on Kerberos for three reasons:

Firstly, it was great bragging rights for UPEO's Galaxy Garrison which planned and financed the mission, Neucom which designed the lander, and Gründer Industries which designed and built the shuttle and the rocket.

Secondly, it would allow them to take ice and soil samples of Kerberos, which a recent flyby had revealed the existence of life-building hydrocarbons. The search for life on Mars had so far turned up fruitless, but if life could be found here (and next year on Europa) it would say a lot about the universe.

Thirdly, a selfie on Kerberos would probably cause Instagram's global servers to all burst into flames at once, and that was always good for recruitment and raking in that sweet, sweet donation money.

"I was born ready, Sam."

The older man smiled at the younger Seianese man in the pilot seat. Now _that_ was a pilot's mindset, not the doubting Donna persona that Shiro had taken upon himself for the past few days as they began to approach Pluto's miniscule gravity well.

"All right... There's the landing point, take us in."

The landing site for this the first manned mission to Kerberos's surface was at the narrow end of an arrowhead-shaped plain. Well, a plain with numerous hills, rises, and other words for 'car-sized chunks of ice rising out of the otherwise level surface'.

The lander _Endeavor_ detached from the orbiter with a hefty _clunk_ and gently fell down to the surface, steered and slowed in its descent by chemical rockets. At just over fifty miles per hour and a thousand feet above the surface, the wheel covers retracted and the 'landing gear' folded out - wheels of spun aluminum-titanium alloy glistened darkly in the weak sunlight of the outer Solar System. It hit the ground at a little over fifteen miles per hour, bouncing once and drifting to a sideways stop.

A bit rattled but otherwise unhurt, the brave UPEO Space Corps crew sallied forth in their trusty craft.

"I'm sure glad the ice held up after that. Maybe next time we should increase the suspension travel…"

"We'd have to make the whole ship bigger, Sam. The ice is fine. C'mon, let's get those samples."

A few minutes of driving revealed the perfect place for some good, clean science: A clearing free of outcroppings a few times wider than the _Endeavor_. Matt parked the lander and secured the parking clamps (you know, just in case a cold, dead moon were to have any seismic activity) while Shiro and Sam got out the drill. Even on an icy moon with a measly percentage of Earth's gravity, drills were heavy.

At the very least, the drill was a lot easier to set up and use than it was to get out. It folded out like a tripod, and operation was almost fully operated - just plug in the depth needed and it'll core the ice for you. Not five minutes later, the drill had extracted a glass-smooth cylinder of ice, colored a bluish-white by the gases and impurities within.

The container opened at the top, one wall flopping out at an angle to ease extraction of the core. Matt did the honors, and narrowly avoided dropping it. He silently cursed the lack of grip on the gloves the mission was provided. Or maybe the cylinder was just that smooth.

"Easy, son, that ice is delicate."

Just to be on the safe side, Matt turned the cylinder over in his hands. No cracks, no chips, no splinters. All was well, and the mission was going perfectly.

They were soon to change their minds, however. Being captured by a giant purple alien spaceship tends to do that.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Commander Iverson stared dumbstruck at the enormous ship on the screen before him. Behind him was pandemonium, but it could have been worse. The feed could have been live. Instead, the Kerberos mission was being edited so the communications to Kerberos would better match up with those coming from the distant moon, which enabled them to cut out things like giant alien ships.

His lack of composure lasted but a second, and with a roar he silenced the command center.

"Two things. Firstly - not _one word_ of this leaves this room without _my_ permission. I don't care if you have to shoot yourself in the head to keep from leaking this, it _does not leave this room._ Captain Takashi Shirogane, Dr. Samuel Holt, and Lieutenant Matthew Holt died due to pilot error when Shiro overcompensated to avoid flying into the path of a previously undiscovered ice geyser. _That is all._ There are no aliens, and they _sure as fuck_ didn't abduct our crew."

"Second. Get me ISAF Strategic Command. Tell them to accelerate work on Stonehenge immediately. If they ask why, tell them I will inform them when we figure out exactly what we can and cannot risk getting leaked without causing a worldwide panic."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"Commander Karreck."

"Yes, Lord Zarkon?"

"Maintain standard patrol routes for the sector. When the opportunity arises, send a ship to investigate the X-9-Y system in greater detail."

"I'll send a battleship, sir."

"See that you do."

* * *

 **AN:** Prologue is short because prologues are meant to be short, and I couldn't think of a good way to segue this into the 'One Year Later' scene to follow without resorting to a chapter break, and I didn't want to completely ape the prologue scene of s1e1 - this scene is pretty much identical for this AU anyway. Even with railguns and lasers, there's not much Ace Combat's Earth can do that Voltron: Legendary Defender's Earth can't at the edges of the Solar System - and I'm honestly guessing at the capabilities of Earth here when it comes to what the Ace Combat Earth's space technology will be like by the 2040s. The next (or should I say first?) chapter will feature much more obvious differentiation from canon.

Also I've intentionally left the current condition of Stonehenge vague, this way I can edit the prologue and first few chapters or so depending on the events of the upcoming Ace Combat 7.

Also also: Seian is a nation designed by myself and a friend on another site for a series of Ace Combat roleplays, largely based off Japan and China, and located to the northeast of Leasath. I will primarily be using that map, which can be found on a link in my profile page.


	2. I: The Impact

**AN:** first chapter, let's do this right

 **disclaimer:** yeah ok. Ace Combat is property of Project Aces and Bandai Namco Entertainment, Inc; Voltron: Legendary Defender is property of DreamWorks Animation, WEP, and Studio Mir. The author owns none of these companies.

* * *

 **Mutenbe Air Base, Islamic Republic of Sotoa**

 **250km WNW of the Western South Sotoa/Sotoa/Central Sotoa Tripoint**

 **June 21, 2041**

 **11:30 AM Local Time**

A motley crew of pilots stood clustered around an oil drum-turned-table in the shade of a corrugated metal hangar, water and cards in hand - they were launching soon and ethanol + pilot seat = bad day. A diminutive Belkan, a svelte Sapinic, and a heavyset Perfanesian, all in UPEO flightsuits - only the flag patches on their shoulders identifying their nationalities as Belkan, Osean, and Perfanesian respectively. Their names were 2nd Lt Patrick 'Pidge' Gunderson, 2nd Lt Tsuyoshi 'Hunk' Garrett, and 1st Lt Lance 'Tailor' Piquero Bellmonte.

Their chests bore the sigil of their squadron - a black gullwinged plane with a shark mouth and a horse's bridle, being rode by a bearded man in a blue pirate costume - 9th UPEO Air Division 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron, Corsair. Or they would have, had any of them been wearing their flight suits properly - the Belkan had unzipped theirs and let its upper parts hang limply on their arms, though the Osean and Perfanesian had simply unzipped theirs to let air flow around their torsae.

Their planes sat ready in their hangar, waiting for the signal to launch. With the COFFIN systems installed, they almost looked like drones - but no, these three planes were all piloted aircraft. The miracle of COFFIN removed the need for glass cockpits. Sitting nearest to them was Hunk's equally hunky aircraft - a Neucom R-302D Fregata. Big delta wings, heavy armor, and four massive engines made the large attacker unmistakeable, and tan-green-and-turquoise 'coastal' camouflage set it apart from other Fregatas. Sure, the Fregata was old, and early models had their teething issues, but the D variant had fixed most of them, and it was still better than the newer R-201 Asterozoa.

Next to it, Lance's R-101 Delphinus. Organic lines to go with its laminar flow control technology granting it incredible maneuverability, it looked quite spindly all things considered, with a strange spade-shaped tail and rectangular vertical stabilizer. Furthering its oddness was that unlike Hunk or Pidge's aircraft, Lance made no attempt to provide his plane with camouflage - the trailing edge and most of the forward fuselage was a cheery Neucom blue, with the rest of the plane being a bluish-white.

Pidge's was the most practically-colored, and the newest. An EF-35E Howler, apart from the glassless cockpit and large hump on the back to store the electronic warfare equipment, it looked like a pretty standard F-35B. Green and tan jungle camo covered the top and sides, with a pale blue-grey underbelly and a bright white stripe down the back separating it from the regular camouflaged sorts.

The game was hold'em, and the trio played with cheap plastic chips. Well, 'played' would be a rather grandiose and sugar-coated term for 'Pidge and Hunk were neck and neck while simultaneously crushing Lance out of existence'. Hunk was in the lead, but that had changed four times in the past fifteen minutes and would change again - Lance was dealing and Pidge's cool was about to break.

Lance's patience with the heart of the cards was just about at its limit, as evidenced by his emotional (nervous) face compared to Hunk and Pidge, who could have been mistaken for statues.

"Screw it. Fold." said the Lance.

" _Ha_ ," said the Pidge, their stony face breaking for the first time in twenty-five minutes. "Straight flush. Pony up, bitches."

"Three of a kind," mumbled Hunk halfheartedly, tossing his cards on top of the pot, which Pidge slid into their own growing pile.

"You're all lucky this isn't a serious game 'cause we're on QRA," added a grim-looking Lance.

"Whaaaat?" asked Pidge in mock incredulity that dripped from their words like grease from a cut-open stick of deep fried butter. "Are you saying that, were we not on high alert, you would actually stand a chance against I, Pidge and He, Hunk? Preposterous! Were we not on high alert, I, Pidge, would flatten you both."

"Yeah, well-"

Lance's retort, which would have no doubt been eloquent and precise, was interrupted by the whining roar of an approaching jet. The squat form of an RQ-170 drone, decked out in jungle camouflage, made its presence known. It rolled to a stop just a few meters past the hangar.

At the same time, a man burst in from the door at the back of the hangar, panting and sweating like he'd attempted to run a marathon in the sweltering heat. Three pairs of eyes turned to face him.

"Get to your planes - the drone got spotted on the way back!"

Three pilots swore in three different languages and ran for their three planes.

"We probably don't have more than thirty minutes before the rebels get their planes in the air!"

"All right people, let's go, go, go! I want you all up in the air in 5," commanded Lance as he practically flew into his cockpit. Sliding on his helmet, he plugged in the cables to the back of his helmet and tensed slightly as the aircraft faded away and began to communicate with his neurons. It was an odd feeling, but after the first few times using COFFIN, you got used to it. Some even grew to like it.

« _Tower, who's our AWACS?_ »

Pidge. A typical question - UPEO could provide a lot, but for smaller squadrons like Paladin, where pilots practically had to pay for everything out of pocket - thank God oil was cheap and planes were discounted for UPEO - it generally didn't provide airborne early warning craft. Or if it did, it liked to shuffle them around for various reasons. Paladin was one of the latter, which was a good thing as airborne early warning craft were expensive, as were the crew required to fly 'em.

« _Some Nordennaviker Captain, name of Sven Holgersson. I think his callsign was Regulus. He's taking off from runway 2._ »

« _Tell him to launch as soon as the three of us are airborne,_ » said Lance as he looked behind him - one of the advantages of COFFIN, the cockpit didn't block your vision.

« _We'll wait for him, but tell him we won't wait long._ »

« _I_ _'ll pass it along._ »

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 **Near Nyaroiba Air Base, Islamic Republic of Sotoa**

 **June 21, 2041**

 **11:56 AM Local Time**

 **15,000 Feet Above Ground Level**

It was a beautiful sight.

The Yare River cut through the level terrain in a gentle east-west arc, an inky blue-black parenthesis in a sea of greens and tans on an eleven hundred mile journey to the Eusean Ocean to the west. A vast wetland spreads out in the cradle of the arc, tens of kilometers wide in places and hundreds of kilometers in others further to the west. To the north, the wetland faded to the greens and browns of the Zahel grasslands, here dotted with trees and shrubs. To the south, the green of the wetlands expanded and grew to a shag carpet of trees.

It was so beautiful, it was almost a shame that they were here to blow it up.

Interrupting the carpet was a two-lane highway, heading east to edge a pentagonal bit of raised land on the edge of the river, just large enough to fit an airfield with three landing strips - two parallel and one perpendicular, six hangars, and a couple buildings. Beyond it, some twenty miles away, was the city of sixty thousand it was named after - Nyaroiba, located on a small rocky hill that provided a commanding view of the river.

« _To all UPEO aircraft - this is AWACS Regulus. Range to Nyaroiba Base: 50 miles. Corsair Squadron, attack formation, you may fire when ready._ »

« _So Regulus,_ said the Hunk with a bit more than usual curiosity in his voice.« _What's on the menu this fine day?_ »

« _Let's see… just like the drone's report said. Four SA-15 Gauntlets, four SA-19 Grisons, and two SA-22 Greyhounds. According to our intel, there should be eight MiG-35Ds on base and two in the air, with eight Bears and four Y-20s._ »

« _Pidge to Regulus, don't you mean MiG-35K?_ »

« _Negative. Those are glass cockpit MiGs, I can tell from the radar._ »

« _._ _..well I'll be damned. They are glassheads!_ »

Lance mapped out the situation in his head. If he were a betting man, he'd say the newer Greyhounds with their superior missile range would be nearest the base, with the Grisons at the near edge of the land space used by the base - their range was meager but they could still do some damage, and they would do their best damage well within their range. The Gauntlets' range was between that of the Greyhound and Grison (12 km vs 20 and 8, respectively) so they would form the middle 'ring', with one at either end of the parallel airstrips.

The MiGs would normally be trouble, but if they were still using glass cockpits they had to be some thirty years back in technology at the minimum.

Yeah. They could do this. They could easily do this.

« _All right! Let's do this. Hunk - you take out those Greyhounds before anything else, we don't need a safety ceiling that high. Pidge, once we get in firing range you turn on your jamming and you keep it on. Try and take everything out before they get in the air, but if they do, don't worry, we've all got air-to-air. I'll keep the fighters off your back._ »

« _Understood._ »

« _Jawohl! Regulus, who's our backup?_ »

« _Belkan Air Force Gabel squadron, four F-16XF Gyrfalcons. ETA in ten minutes._ »

 _We'll handle things until then, I suppose._ »

« _All right. We all know the plan. To all UPEO aircraft, this is Corsair Actual, callsign Tailor. Engage! Weapons free!_ »

« _Corsair Two, Engaging!_ »

« _Corsair Three, Engaging!_ »

The three planes all surged forward in tight formation before breaking away from each other - Lance's R-101 towards the fighters, Pidge's EF-35E towards the heavens, and the four engines of Hunk's R-302D sent it screaming towards the Earth below, pulling up only to level up a mere thousand feet above the ground.

Pidge hm-hm'd in their cockpit and cracked their knuckles as they prepared to work their magic on the rebels. A few thoughts, and their 'control panel' indicated that all the necessary ECM equipment was up and running. Almost immediately, the sound of air raid sirens made itself known even through the roar of the turbofan behind them. If the base didn't know they were under attack before, they sure as Hell did now.

« _Pidge to friendlies, music and buzzer active. They can't see or hear us._ »

« _Perfect timing. Rifle!_ »

The R-302 was a big plane, with big wings and big load ratings for its wings, meaning it could carry some serious firepower on the outboard pylons if one didn't care much about stealth, and even more on the inboard weapon bays. With jamming, one didn't need to care (as) much about stealth, and thus 2nt Lt Garrett's Fregata was armed to the teeth, with all four pylons filled - two one-ton bombs (imperial, that is) and six AIM-190 JAGMs, effectively a better Maverick missile. The gold standard for air to ground.

One such missile dropped from the left wing and streaked towards its target, an SA-22 Greyhound anti-air weapons platform. With guns and missiles, it was a major threat, but its superior range to the SA-19 it was built to replace made the most of the danger.

But with Pidge's jamming fully active on every band UPEO wasn't using at the time, it didn't have time to get a lock on Hunk's plane, let alone fire, and let alone see the missile coming. The anti-air unit and the tracked vehicle it was mounted on exploded in a great vertical fireball behind Hunk as he pulled up and released first one bomb and then the other, guided by his aircraft's computer.

« _Pickle!_ »

The first bomb landed in one of the hangars as one of the bombers began to pull out in a very emergency emergency takeoff. When the bomb plunged through the roof and handily blasted the hangar to pieces, the aforementioned bomber found itself bereft of a tail and promptly booped its own nose on the tarmac. Secondary explosions and bits of hangar set off in the hangars next to the now completely destroyed hangar, which set off secondary explosions in a fourth hangar, which set the control tower next to it ablaze.

The second bomb slammed into the second runway on top of a Y-20, and the cargo plane ceased to exist. It also left a sizable dent in the runway, reducing the number of usable airstrips down to the two parallel strips.

« _Hey Hunk, we want to_ use _this airfield once we've cleared it of the rebels, you know?_ »

« _Sorry, force of habit. How're you doin?_ »

Lance was doing quite well for himself, all things considered. The MiG-35s in the air had promptly gone after him as soon as they had him on radar, and continued to attempt to pursue even when the jamming came on - Pidge stuck close enough that the jamming was intense near him but not so close that she herself would be put in (too much) danger. Whatever these MiGs were expecting, they clearly weren't expecting to have much use for infrared guidance, because they only had four between them, and a whole lot of radar-guided missiles. Which they were currently in the process of firing uselessly at Lance who simply maneuvered out of the way of the missiles or, rarely, dropped just enough chaff to get them off his tail. When the did get a solid lock, he let them hold it _juuust_ long enough for them to think they had him before dumping chaff and running. They kept focus on him, while Hunk wreaked havoc with their air defenses - after all, with Lance out of the picture, they'd be able to escape easily once Hunk was down.

So tightly did they focus on Lance's R-101 that they failed to notice the EF-35 behind them until, upon it noticing they were out of radar-guided missiles, it locked on to _them._

« _Pidge,_ _ **Fox Three!**_ »

The MiG-35s had been utilizing the AA-12 Adder (aka R-77) missile, which Yuktobania had developed in response to Osea's AIM-120 AMRAAM. They were good missiles for the time, but even the K-77ME had begun to look a little old by this the year 2041 that it found itself being utilized in, and the K-77 wasn't designed to be used under heavy jamming. Pidge's Meteor Mk III missiles, jointly developed by Belka, Usea, and Nordennavik, however, _were_.

At the very least, their ejection seats still worked.

« _Good kills, Corsair Squadron._ »

« _Yeah, well it's not over yet._ »

Hunk had by this point finished off the second Greyhound and was now moving on to the Gauntlets. These would prove less of a challenge - while both the Greyhound and Gauntlet were capable of shooting down missiles, the Gauntlet was specifically designed to be able to fire under intense jamming, however the Greyhound could fire while moving and the Gauntlet couldn't. The Gauntlet also lacked guns, which all the countermeasures in the world couldn't protect you from.

« _Rifle._ »

Another missile descended from Hunk's craft. The Gauntlet tried - too late - to shoot it down with a missile of its own, and severely damaged itself in the process. It wasn't destroyed per se, but it was certainly out of the fight. As he turned, he noticed two of the remaining bombers lining up to takeoff, with two of the MiGs beginning to taxi.

« _Hunk to Tailor, be advised we've got two Bears and two Fulcrums taking off with… one of the cargo planes on the way._ »

« _All right, we'll take care of it, you focus on those SAMs!_ »

« _Wilco._ »

Hunk turned towards the next Gauntlet in his path as Lance flew low and Pidge flew high. Lance kept to the 'bushes' at less than 500 feet It would be easy, *painfully* easy, to just destroy the bombers where they were and keep them from taking off, but they intended to capture this base once Corsair and Gabel squadrons were done neutralizing it, so he had to wait.

Two more of the Gauntlets were destroyed by Hunk's missile fire as Lance waited, one of them managing to get two missiles out and nearly hit him. Only through chaff, the jamming, and high-G turns did he manage to avoid it as the second bomber rose into the air. (Thank God for G-pants.) And even then, the left wing of his Fregata was still peppered with bits of shrapnel. (Thank God for armor!)

The fourth was blown away from the position of the third without Hunk even bothering to go after it - two close calls so close together was enough to make him think twice about getting close to such a target, even with jamming. At least the Grisons were old enough that they wouldn't pose near as much of a threat. He could just metaphorically park himself outside of their firing range and blast away, thought Hunk as the second MiG took off, just as Gabel squadron arrived.

 _There we go!_ »

« _Gabel Actual to Corsair Actual. Looks like you have the situation under control. Want some extra assistance anyway?_ »

« _Anything to speed up getting rid of that anti-air, hiding like this all the time is crampin' my style, stealth or no stealth._ »

« _Understood. Gabel Squadron, Engage._ »

Besides bullets, the infrared-guided missiles Lance's R-101 was packing were probably the oldest things on the battlefield, at least their original versions were. The Sidewinder, which had survived almost a century without replacement, was still the mainstay short-range missile of the Osean Air Self-Defense Force with no replacements planned. Chalk it up to it being designed to be upgraded from the beginning. Lance's plane packed four of the latest as befitting a flight leader.

Lance was about to expend all four of them in one salvo, and completely get away with it. The Grisons would've had enough trouble locking onto him were his R-101 not a semistealth aircraft, and taking off left an aircraft extremely vulnerable to enemy fire - all effort had to be put into gaining altitude, and any evasive maneuvers were as likely to send your ass to the dirt and your soul to heaven as a missile was. The sound of the Sidewinder's guidance system switched from a low growl to a high whine as Lance locked on.

« _Tailor, Fox Two!_ »

Two dropped from the inner of the three pylons on each wing, and two more from the R-101's admittedly miniscule weapon bays.

The first hit the MiG in the rear squarely between the engines, and the warhead took out most of the vertical and horizontal stabilizers, but the MiG was able to survive long enough for the pilot to eject at a not-totally-lethal altitude.

The second hit the first MiG to take off directly below the engine intakes, cutting the plane neatly in half. That was far less survivable, and all three UPEO pilots winced at the display. Not a fun way to go.

The first and second bombers were killed in roughly the same way, but mirrored - each lost the outboard engine on their wings, each tumbled to the ground sideways, each made a lovely fireball that was of the size one would expect of an unladen strategic bomber.

« _Good kills, Corsair One._ »

« _What can I say? I never miss. Hunk, Gabel Squad, how you doin'?_ »

An explosion to the south answered him, and at last the anti-air guns fell silent.

« _I'll take that as a... 'doing good'. Let the choppers know they can land at their convenien-_ »

« _Warning! Warning! Bandits inbound from vector 280. They're F-15S/MTs - Four of them._ »

« _They're locked on to us!_ »

« _They're firing! MIRVs! MIRVs! Break!_ »

Sure enough, the radar warning receivers of all of UPEO's planes screamed at them to turn, dump chaff, and do anything to _get out of the way_ of the incoming multi-warhead missiles, a feat they managed well enough to survive. Gabel Two and Three had gotten severe wing damage, and Hunk lost an engine. He'd still be able to fly, but for the time being he'd be more harm than help in an air-to-air battle, and Gabel Two and Three were definitely out of the fight. It was up to Lance, Pidge, and Gabel One and Four now.

« _Corsair One to Gabel One, what do you have for air-to-air?_ »

« _Two Sidewinders, two JDRAMs between us. You?_ »

« _I've got four JDRAMs left, and Pidge has a pair of Meteors._ »

« _Well, we better make them count. Engage!_ »

The four planes of UPEO turned to face their foes. Lance and Gabel One fired the opening shots - a JDRAM each. The replacement for the AMRAAM, the JDRAM was designed more for beyond visual range combat than a pure dogfight, but it was nimble enough to handle close range combat in a pinch. The F-15s responded in kind with JDRAMs of their own.

Both groups charging forward, the missiles missed each other by scant inches, and the rebel's missed the UPEO flight by the grace of chaff and Pidge's jamming, but not by enough to prevent them from getting a cantaloupe-sized chunk torn out of their left wing. The UPEO flight's missiles managed to hit one of their targets, knocking out one of the F-15's engines and damaging the left canard of another.

A new salvo, with the same missiles but this time Pidge let loose with one of her Meteors, and the F-15s retaliated with a JDRAM each. No-one was downed, but a second F-15 was damaged - this time on the right wing.

Ten miles. Now within visual range, and the range of the far more agile and accurate Sidewinders. Gabel squadron fired both of theirs, and Lance fired his remaining JDRAMs. This time, both of the damaged F-15s were knocked from the sky, but the lead plane remained, and the UPEO planes were undamaged.

« _Gabel to Regulus, we are Winchester._ »

« _Tailor to Regulus, Winchester. Out of missiles. Continuing attack._ »

 _Come on baby, you wanna dance? Let's dance._

Five miles. Neither side fired, instead they accelerated on a collision course - a supersonic game of chicken, or a joust with exploding lances. The old school way of deciding victory between jet aces.

Three miles. Lance and Pidge could easily make out the sole remaining F-15S/MT. It was seal brown on top with a single salmon-colored stripe down the middle, and a blue underside. Vulture squadron. Not _the_ best the rebels had to offer, but certainly one of the better ones. Still, no side fired.

One mile. Very close. At this distance you could make out the stains on the paint.

Half a mile, within effective gun firing range. The RWR sounded, Vulture One was going to fire a missile (dangerous at this range, but frighteningly accurate) and if Lance was going to survive he had to do something _fast_.

« _Pidge, Fox Three!_ »

Vulture One _moved_ , breaking up and to the left in the hardest turn Lance had ever seen an Eagle derivative perform in his life, putting it right in the sights of his gun. He didn't have time to think, so he reacted. Five 20mm shells slammed into the sky blue underside of the Eagle before him, and while it wasn't enough to blow him out of the sky, it was enough to put him out of the fight.

« _Pidge to Regulus, Winchester._ »

« _Regulus to Pidge, roger._ »

« _Is that all of them?_ »

« _...Confirmed. A squadron of glasshead F-35s was en route to assist Vulture squadron, but they are retreating. No further enemy activity in the area outside of the base._ »

« _Excellent. Regulus, tell the choppers that they can now move in to take the base._ »

In the air, it was over. With their only chance of rescue gone, the remaining aircraft on the ground were as good as captured. Nyaroiba Air Base would return to the legitimate Sotoan government and UPEO forces by three in the afternoon, and Nyaroiba would be recaptured by sunset.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 **Westchesterfields Hotel, Room 307**

 **Nyaroiba, Islamic Republic of Sotoa**

 **June 21, 2041**

 **8:27 PM Local Time**

The bad news, Hunk's bombs had burned down most of the officer's quarters, so UPEO was making do with hotels within Nyaroiba.

The good news? The stars of the battle got a corner room.

The bad news? There were only two beds.

The good news? The couch pulled out - and surprisingly was about as comfortable as the mattresses. (Pidge got the couch, they wanted the couch pillows.)

The bad news? The battle to retake Nyaroiba had smashed up the kitchen, so there would be none of the hotel's famed Yare Perch filet.

The good news? Hunk made some himself.

"It's still hot, so be careful - that means you, Pat."

"That was _one time,_ Hunk!"

"You couldn't eat anything but oatmeal and Gatorade for a _week,_ man!"

"I'll be _fine!_ Jeez, you sound like my mother. Where's Lance?"

"Getting the beer. We don't have any combat missions for the next few days, so it should be-"

The door creaked. In walked Lance, carrying two crates of some dark liquid that could arguably be considered beer in some parts of the world. He placed it on the table next to the platter of fish fillets, which Hunk and Pidge were greedily splitting between themselves.

"Hey, leave some for _me!_ "

"Snooze ya lose, Lance."

And thus did their dinner progress. Drinks were had, fish were eaten, stories were told and exaggerated, and the three of them decided on how specifically to exaggerate the day's events to the civilians of today and the nuggets of tomorrow.

Minutes passed to hours, and by ten PM the 'celebration' as some would call it began to wind down. As the other aces began to turn in for the night, Pidge grabbed their laptop bag and a backpack and snuck out of the room - no small feat with as creaky a floor as the Westchesterfields Hotel's third floor. At least the floors were carpeted.

The door to the roof stairs was on the eighth floor and controlled with an electronic lock. But for someone who had spent most of their lives studying programming, computer engineering, and cybersecurity, it wasn't that hard. Also the password was written down under the 'DO NOT ENTER' sign taped to the door. 1-0-8-4.

The hotel roof was flat and bare apart from the stair door and a few HVAC machines. Nyaroiba was a sizable town that had just sustained a battle, but there were no fires burning at this late hour and it was remote enough that one could see most of the stars. More than Pidge ever could have back home in Hoffnung, at least.

It sucked that there wasn't a suitable plug up on the roof (their laptop had more than enough battery life to last the night, but it was nice to have a plug _just in case_ ), but they could deal with it for now. First the laptop boot up, then the portable wireless router, then the radio receiver, a notepad, an erasable pen, a pair of thermal/visual binoculars, and lastly their headphones.

Her laptop came on, and the familiar sight of Galm Team's F-15s above the skies of B7R greeted her. A few mouse clicks later, and it was replaced with a program of her own design for monitoring communications - from Earth, from the rudimentary lunar colony under construction, and of course from alien life. It was no Perfanesian Extremely Large Telescope, but it could reach as far as the Oort Cloud and that was good enough.

"Monitoring active and… what the hell?"

Their expletive was well-deserved - they hadn't seen this level of activity since they started listening in, during the Kerberos mission. No, wait, it was even more intense than it was then. Was something interfering with the signal, bouncing it off against some bit of space junk? Were fake signals being fed to the receiver to drown out anything important? Had they been discovered? Were-

"Whatcha listenin' to, Pat?"

If Pidge were in their jet they wouldn't have moved as fast as they did. They practically _flew_ up from their seated position and slammed their back into Lance's chest and their head into his chin.

After disentangling each other and letting out a few choice words in a variety of languages, Pidge calmed down enough to be angry at Lance for another reason besides being in the flight path of their skull.

"Jesus, Lance, you scared the shit out of me…"

"So what _are_ you doin' up here, anyway?"

"Oh, y'know, just… stargazing."

"With a radio telescope," Hunk added as he finally left the doorway.

"...yes."

"So what's the range?" asked Hunk, his hand drawing closer to the machinery only to be swatted away by Pidge.

"I can detect signals from the far edges of the solar system."

"Really? Can you reach Kerberos?"

Pidge sighed, and swatted Hunk's hand away yet again.

"Hey, Pat, if you don't want to tell us, it's fine-"

"Nah, I was gonna tell you some day anyway. The Kerberos mission… wasn't lost due to pilot error, or an acci- _Final warning, Garrett._ "

"Last name. He's serious, Hunk. Anyway, go on."

"So I've been scanning the area and I've been picking up… alien radio chatter."

Pidge let the statement hang in the air for a few seconds. Hunk looked… frightened, but he had always been a bit skittish when not in something heavily armored. Lance looked like he was deciding whether to laugh or just pass off this as another one of Pidge's infamous conspiracy theories. He chose the latter.

"Ok, so first you believe in Cipher, now you believe in aliens."

"They're _both real, asshole!_ And I have proof, look!" Pidge slid their computer screen to the side, allowing their squadmates to get a better look at the screen. It was showing a tremendous amount of communications traffic from well beyond Neptune's orbit, in the general direction of where Kerberos and Pluto had been about a year ago. Still, Lance refused to show that he was impressed, at least just yet.

"Okay, so there's a lot of radio chatter coming from the Kuiper Belt. What do they want?"

"Something about a 'Voltron' or whatever. And I've gotten more traffic in the past ten minutes than I've gotten all month, so-"

The sirens sounded.

In general, there were three kinds of public, non-vehicular sirens one would hear in the world.

The first, was a storm siren - it varied by region, but it was easily identifiable and was inevitably accompanied by the sights and sounds of the oncoming storm.

The second, was an air raid siren - a long, loud wail that rose and fell. It indicated the approach of bombers, attackers, or some other weapon of destruction towards the city.

The third was the worst of all, represented by a wail that staggered up and down. The third was a Ulysses siren, which was used for one purpose - falling fragments of the asteroid that shattered the post-Belkan War peace in 1999 and sparked countless other wars. Even 42 years later, the repercussions were still being felt.

"A fragment? There hasn't been one in-"

"Eighteen years. Oh, this is bad, this is very bad.." The usual panic from Hunk in regards to anything to do with Ulysses or meteors in general. Pidge, however, grabbed their binoculars for a closer look, switching rapidly between the infrared and visual spectrum.

"Wait… that's no-HEY!"

Lance with his usual swiftness took the binoculars for some look-seeing of his own.

"Okay, so Pat's right. There are aliens. And that's an alien ship."

Hunk seemed to calm down for all of half a second as the bright red meteor in the sky grew larger and larger until it was pretty clearly a ship about the size of an R-352 Sepia starfighter. As the other two gawked, Pidge hastily gathered up their gear and ran towards the fire exit.

"Whoa, Pat, where are you goin?"

"If that's an alien ship then I'll be damned if I'm not going to get a closer look when it lands!"

"But what if-" Lanced sighed. The conspiracy theorist had a point, much as he didn't want to admit it at this hour. Why couldn't aliens land in the daytime?

"Fine. Hunk, you left the rifles in the truck, right?"

"Of course I did, why?"

"Just in case."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 **Crash Site**

 **10:39 PM Local Time**

It was a blessed and merciful god that designed the L-ATV's suspension system. Over hill, dale, pothole, gravel road, felled tree, and boulder it rode and the frame and suspension did not once complain. Twenty years of production and still steady as a continent. A continent on big rollerskates.

Pidge stood in the back seat with their head and upper body sticking out of the hatch on the roof, their binoculars practically glued to their eyes. Speaking over the roar of the diesel engine was impossible , but slapping the roof and pointing with their feet when necessary was enough to steer Lance around the more difficult obstacles that even a military offroader wasn't able to handle.

A helicopter thwopped overhead, heading towards the crash site. Pidge, satisfied with their direction, slid back into the cabin and shut the hatch.

"Almost there. Hurry up, that's the second chopper they've sent."

The L-ATV whumped its way over a fallen log, and Lance pulled it up behind a large rock at the edge of a small cliff overlooking a minor tributary of the Yare River and a roughly acre-sized clearing in the trees that was currently occupied by two heavy helicopters, four L-ATVs with guns on the back, three ambulance L-ATVs, two hazmat trucks, four regular tents, one hazmat tent, and the crashed ship. The three pilots climbed out as silently as they could and took position next to the rock, with the laptop hidden behind it.

"It… looks like a shoe," mused Hunk.

He was right - it did look like a shoe. It was somewhat roundish for most of its body, wider than it was tall, with purple lights on the roof and sides, complementing the dark greys and blacks of the hull. The front end was a bit narrower than the back, with the 'main' body of the nose being about as wide as a fighter's nose, and six flat triangular protrusions on either side of the nose - canards, perhaps? Some sort of control surface judging by how they were jointed to the hull. The ship itself had been strapped to a flatbed truck.

It was also heavily guarded by soldiers with-

"Are those _laser rifles?!"_ half-shouted Lance incredulously before he could catch himself. "They only give those to special forces!"

"Well, whatever was on that ship, there's no way mere mortals like us can-"

"Wait, hold on Hunk, I almost got the feed to one of the security cameras… there."

The feed was fuzzy, but it showed the interior of what could only have been the hazmat tent. There were the usual hazmat medics in hazmat suits, medical equipment, and on the table was an older Shiro than any of them remembered, in black and grey-violet rags. And he did _not_ look happy. Or angry. More distressed-via-fear-and-exasperation.

« _What are you doin-_ »

« _You know the drill, Shiro. Have to keep you in quarantine in case you got some kinda Andromeda Strain out there._ »

« _No, they've- they've shattered planets, enslaved entire species - ggh- Aliens are coming, and they're coming soon!_ »

"That's Captain Shiro, the guy who convinced me to sign up in the UPEO Air Force."

"Guess he's not dead after all. You were right, Pat."

 _But where's Matt… and Dad_ , said Pidge to no-one but their own mind.

« _Do you know how long you were out there?_ »

« _A year? More, less? We don't have time for this! Aliens are coming here for a weapon, and they're probably en route now! We don't stand a chance unless we start preparations_ _ **now**_ _! We have to find… we have to find Voltron!_ »

"There's that Voltron thing _again!_ "

"So even a prisoner knows about this 'Voltron'? Guess those aliens don't have very good opsec."

« _Look at his arm, some kind of cybernetic implant._ »

« _Put him under until we know what that thing's capable of._ »

« _What? No, no, don't put me under, please, you need to LISTEN, there's NO TIME-_ »

"They didn't even ask about the rest of the crew," said Pidge sadly to no-one but themselves, but out loud.

"More importantly, why aren't they at least giving him the benefit of the doubt? This guy's clearance is off the scale, it's not like he's an idiot."

"We _have_ to get him out of there," Pidge said as they stood up abruptly.

"Yeah, c'mon, let-

"Whoa, whoa, wait, Pat, Lance, hold on - weren't we watching everything from a hacked security cam because of the _laser rifles_ and _laser machine guns?_ "

"Yeah, well that was before he confirmed every crazy thing Pat has said as long as we've known him except for the shit about Cipher."

"We could steal some Hazmat suits..."

"We could sneak in there, Solid Snake style…"

"Or, OR, we wait for UPEO to declassify this entire thing, and while we wait, go to that neat shawarma place I saw on 5th and Botha."

Stares.

"...yeah, okay fine. But seriously, _how?_ "

"We need some kind of distraction."

Explosions rocked the countryside and threatened to rock the rock off the cliff. Four explosions from what looked like large IEDs on the other side of the Yare River.

"Yeah, like that."

As the UPEO trucks raced off towards the source of the explosions, a red hovercar raced towards the hazmat tent from the east over the river. Odd technology, hovercars. A recent invention and growing rapidly in popularity, but so far no military has bothered to use them - a wheeled vehicle won't crash into the ground if the engine dies, after all.

"Who is that?"

In response to Pidge's question, Lance once again practically pulled their arm off to get the binoculars.

"Of all the… that's Keith!"

"Who?"

"Oh great, here he goes."

"Oh he is _not_ stealing this from me! Come on!" Lance didn't even wait for the others, he just slid down the cliffside and practically _ran_ across the shallow river, as well as one can run across a shallow river.

"Seriously, who's Keith?"

Hunk slid off after him, and Pidge followed as close behind as they could after gathering up their equipment in a backpack.

The river was nice and shallow, but it was still deep enough to reach halfway up the shins, which slowed their progress. Sounds of fighting could be heard inside the tent, which only made Lance even more pissed than he already was. For a moment, he seemed to seriously consider just swimming across, but the instant he did the river abruptly grew shallow enough to pick up the pace.

By the time they entered the tent, whatever 'fighting' had taken place was already over. A thin-looking Seianese man with a red jacket and (of all things) a mullet was cutting Shiro free with a dagger, and-

"Nope, nope, no no no, you're not saving Shiro, _I'm_ saving Shiro, you're _helping_ at the most, move."

This 'Keith' looked… nonplussed at the best.

"Who the fuck are you?"

Lance looked even angrier than before, which at this point was a feat.

"Lance! From Heierlark, remember, training, to be a pilot?"

Something almost, but not quite, not entirely unlike realization dawn on Keith's face.

"Oh, right… the cargo pilot."

Hunk sighed, expecting another eruption of Mount Lance, but the volcano proved inert.

"Not anymore! I fly fighters now that you FAIP'd out." Lance seemed proud of this. Hunk was embarrassed for Lance's sake. Pidge had put together a rough idea of what these two's past relationship had been like and was thus also embarrassed for Lance's sake. Keith… tried to pretend to care.

"Oh… congrats."

Keyword tried.

"Look, can we just get Shiro out of here before UPEO realizes what's going on and court martials all our asses to kingdom come? I'd rather not go back to Belka in a prison truck, thanks."

Now Lance was feeling the proper amount of embarrassment at this situation, the five of them moved to the car which mercifully had enough room to seat all five of them. Pidge was _not_ happy with the middle seat, but they were the Smallest so they had to Deal With It.

Whatever had caused those explosions, it was a far enough distance that Keith's hovercar (and Shiro) were long gone by the time the UPEO forces had returned to the crash site.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 **Nyaroiba Air Base**

 **11:48 PM Local Time**

The greatest advantage by far of a hovercar is that as long as the terrain was mostly flat, there was nothing stopping you from speeding along at velocities well beyond what you'd be allowed to travel on a highway. A very useful feature to have when being pursued by trucks that could only do sixty miles per hour on a flat and even road in a straight line. As a result, they managed to get to the base itself well before the trucks did.

However, wireless transmissions do an average of 670,616,629 miles per hour, so what trucks were on base were already at the entrance.

"Great," muttered Lance over the Mindless Self-Indulgence blaring from the radio. "Now unless you plan on jumping the fences-"

"Hang on," said Keith without a _second_ of hesitation as the needle flew past 150 miles per hour.

"Hold up, hold up, I WAS ONLY _KIDDING, JESUS CHRIST LOOK OUT FOR THE-"_

There was no need to tell Keith to look out for the truck turning to stop the hovercar's path, nor to tell Keith to look out for the soldiers now jumping out of its way, or even the ten-foot-tall barbed wire fence that stood to oppose them. Because the hovercar was now twenty feet in the air and for all intents and purposes flying over the fence.

Keith popped the airbrakes, deployed the parking wheels, and powerslid to the front of the 'main' hangar. Surprisingly, the hangar was unguarded - the UPEO forces must have not expected them to make it past the guards at every entrance to the base since neither Lance, nor Hunk, nor Pidge owned a hovercar.

Keith was pulling open the hangar doors as soon as he was out of the car, with no luck until Lance just used the button on the side to open it. Their aircraft, naturally, were all in one hangar - and by this hour, all repaired. Damage had been fairly minimal besides Hunk's damaged engine, and because of its complexity the Fregata was designed to be easily repaired, to make up for it. There was a fourth - a Harrier II trainer with what looked like Mk I COFFIN installed.

"How fast can you three get in the air?, and who has the shortest ferry range?" Keith didn't even bother with asking about anything else, he just hoisted Shiro into the trainee's seat like a sack of potatoes. The Corsair squadron pilots followed suit once they realized he was seriously going to take off with UPEO ground forces after him.

« _Pidge has the shortest ferry route at 1700 miles._ »

« _Good enough. Take off as soon as you can and follow me out. I have a safe house about 1500 miles to the northeast._ »

« _1500 miles to the northea- THAT'S IN KARABASTAN, KEITH YOU FUCKIN-_ »

« _Pidge, try and see if you can't cover our tracks at least until we're out of missile range. My callsign is Ronin._ »

« _Understood, Ronin._ »

« _Hey, I'M the officer of rank here, mullet-_ »But Keith was already in the air and heading off to the northwest, having taken off vertically right in front of the hangar doors.

« _Nyaroiba to Corsair Squadron, what the hell's going on? The MPs are saying you stole something from a special operation-_ »

The three pilots looked at each other, then at the slowly shrinking glow of the exhaust from Keith's Harrier.

They then committed the gravest sin imaginable.

« _Negative, Nyaroiba, we were taken hostage by the guy responsible. Moving to intercept._ »

« _Understood. Will you need assistance?_ »

« _Negative. I know this guy, and he's flying a trainer. We can take him. Pidge, once you're in the air, activate jamming. Hunk, you've got the biggest engines, you bring up the rear so you don't accidentally overshoot the target again._ »

« _Understood! Good luck, Corsair One!_ »

 _We'll need it,_ thought Lance. _Just what_ is _Mullet planning?_

By the stroke of midnight, there were four fighters in the air, en route to the land of Karabastan to the northwest, and something far greater than they could ever have imagined...

* * *

 **AN:** So this took... a _lot_ longer than I had planned. I had originally planned for this to go up the day before or the day of Season 3's release. Oh well. Starting with this chapter I'll be doing factoids and stuff about characters and aircraft involved, along with a few more notable weapons - everything else will be on another 'fic' list for this. And aircraft WILL be involved - Strangereal will play a larger role than Earth in canon Voltron. I'll also define terms used here that can't be found on Wikipedia's list of multiservice tactical brevity codes, for convenience's sake. Oh, and Pidge is still Katherine Holt in this AU, I'm simply using 'their' pronouns until she reveals it ICly. OH! And Pidge is not!Celtic/North Germanic here because a) there is no direct Italy equivalent in Ace Combat (the closest would probably be Emmeria) and b) I headcanoned her as Irish before they announced her being Italian so w/e, some of my fics will have her being of Italian descent some of Irish descent. She'll still speak Italian (Emmerian) though.

 **QRA:** Quick Reaction Alert, a state of combat readiness used IRL by NATO air forces, especially the UK's Royal Air Force. Pilots in QRA are at immediate readiness 24 hours a day, fully dressed in the aircrew ready room (if there is one) in or near the hangar facilities. Aircraft are fueled and loaded with weapons and are expected to be able to take off in 15 minutes or less.

 **Opsec:** OPerational SECurity. Exactly what it sounds like - things need to be on a need-to-know basis and you don't need to know, because opsec. Loose lips sink ships.

 **FAIP:** First Assignment Instructor Pilot, a living Hell for fighter pilots where they spend the next few years training nuggets and n00bs how to not crash to the earth as a burning meteor of death and actually be a fighter pilot.

 **COFFIN:** COnnection For Flight INterface, a control system unique to the Ace Combat series that provides a superior field of view compared to a glass cockpit, in addition to allowing the cockpit to be fully armored (or at the very least not made of glass). The Mk I version, found on the ADF-01 FALKEN, is the simplest and consists of a set of cameras on the exterior of the aircraft (mostly around the cockpit) providing a near seamless 'bubble cockpit' via the video feed. Mk II, the kind here, uses ENSI (Electro-Neuron Synapse Interface) to allow communication between the plane and the pilot via neural connections. This allows them to control the plane at the speed of thought, and provides a seamless sphere of vision to the pilot. The typical control sticks of an aircraft are reduced to a backup role (if they are even present at all), and ENSI contact is made via cables attached to the helmet and neural panels on the seat for the hands to rest on. There is a Mk III system utilizing ONSI (Opto-Neuron Synapse Interface) that connects the plane to the nervous system directly using cables that plug into a cybernetic implant on the back of the neck, and artificially accelerates brain function to better handle piloting. The pilot is only semi-conscious during flight, and stimulus-response delay is nonexistent. However, the Mk III system is expensive and carries the risk of brain damage should the ONSI system be overloaded or interrupted, or if the brain simply receives too much information to handle. Most aircraft by 2041 use either the Mk I or Mk II version of COFFIN. Aircraft without COFFIN are colloquially known as 'glassheads'. The EU is currently experimenting with something similar called Project Brainflight.

So tune in next time, where Hunk throws up, Lance crashes into some things, and Shiro does something leaderly.


	3. II: Lion's Den

**an:** second chapter! second chapter, after all this time! let's do this right.

 **Larg-**

 **disclaimer:** aren't you forgetting something?

 **an:** no? i'm not forgetting-

 **disclaimer:** _ahem_.

 **an:** ooh, right.

 **disclaimer:** Ace Combat is property of Project Aces and Bandai-Namco Entertainment, Inc; Voltron: Legendary Defender is property of DreamWorks Animation, WEP, and Studio Mir. The author owns none of these.

 **Larghar Municipal Airport, Islamic Republic of Karabastan**

 **Larghar, northern Karabastan - population 23,906**

 **June 22, 2041**

 **10:36 Local Time**

It was a universal fact of nature that pilots hated the desert. Sure, shots of planes streaking over the desert blasting tanks, fortifications, and other planes made for good film material, but the reality of being a pilot in the desert was far from what the film industry portrayed, and the difference was only made more so in the modern era. Dust kicked up easily and screwed with sensitive electronics (and far more importantly, jet engines), coating everything in its uniform khakiness and enhancing the silicone levels of any food or water foolishly left outside in even gentle winds.

And that was nothing compared to the oppressive heat, which was everywhere in central Karabastan, and especially here in the largely Irrelevant town of Larghar. The sun shone down like the baleful eye of some pyrophoric god who hated humans and water in equal measure. Cold water turned lukewarm in minutes without the presence of ice - which the airport's refrigerator was out of, and Keith's little 'private hangar' fridge didn't have. The dead wind was good for takeoff (though a continuous tailwind would've been better) but bad for everything else.

In short, deserts sucked, and in the mind of the usually-pampered pilot, they had every right to complain. So they did. At least the shawarma was good. And they didn't even have to save the world for it!

Pidge jealously guarded the opening of their shawarma from the ill wind that blew sand and dust towards their table in the shade, as did Hunk and Lance. The 'private hangar' of Keith's had barely enough room for all of their aircraft and a Cessna Caravan that belonged to the base for short-range transport purposes. It also had its own 'quarters' that looked remarkably like the lobby and room(s, there were two) of a sixty-year-old Osean motel. The base had no cards (Pidge had foolishly left theirs back in Sotoa), so they would have had to make do with dominoes, if anyone besides Lance knew how to play well enough to stand a chance. So they didn't make do with dominoes. The only forms of entertainment besides dominoes were not much better: The television only had shows in Kharabic (which no-one spoke) and seemed to mostly be news, propaganda, and soaps too bland to make fun of. There was a game console, but it was an old, beat-up PlayStation 4 and it only had a scratched-up copy of Horizon: Zero Dawn, Fallout 4, and a party game. Which would have at least been tolerable, but there were only three controllers and no cord. It also had World of Tanks, but the servers had gone down for the PS4 version years ago. So they didn't make do with the television or the PlayStation 4.

Instead, they decided to interrogate (read: annoy) Shiro for information about what the holy hell happened in space.

"Good to have you back," said Keith.

"Good to _be_ back." _Though I probably would've prefered takoyaki for my first meal back…_

"So," said Hunk as he sent his shawarma to the great restaurant in his stomach, "what _happened_ out there? You were gone for a year, where'd you go?"

Shiro had a _look_ , the kind one has when you're confused, and both fearful and slightly angry that you're confused. That was the look he had as he thought up a response, before shaking his head.

"I… wish I could tell you. My head's still pretty scrambled. I was on an alien ship… more than three, I think… but I escaped somehow. It's still a blur."

He swallowed the last bit of his own shawarma before turning to Keith, who was staring intently at a wall hidden from outside view.

"How'd you know where I was going to crash, and more importantly how'd you know _when?_ "

Keith motioned for the four of them to enter, as Lance finished off his shawarma. On the wall was a map of central Karabastan covered in pushpins, string, and photographs - landscapes, carvings, satellite photos, and most important of all, a circle centered around the Cherniy cave system, along the Yuktobanian border.

Lance whistled, as Pidge finished off their shawarma - which had also been the largest one. Hungry guy.

"Someone's been busy."

"What _is_ this," asked Shiro with no small amount of awe in his voice.

"Hard to explain. I dropped from UPEO about a year into getting FAIP'd, I took my Harrier and wandered about, doing odd mercenary jobs, before finally coming here, like I was drawn here. Some… some kind of energy, telling me to search the area."

"For what?"

Lance balled up his wrapper and longshot it into the trash bin on the other side of the room. "Three points," declared Pidge as Keith answered. 

"Well when I started I wasn't sure, apart from the usual radar interference around the Cherniy cave system, until I stumbled across this area." He pointed to the exact center of the circle, from which trailed a bit of string that led to a cave opening some forty meters wide and who knew how deep. There were large, foreboding boulders around the entrance of the cave and two massive stalactites on either side of the roof, with some sort of markings - the photograph was too small to make out any details. Almost like teeth for a massive mouth.

"Well that's imposing. You could sail a carrier through that," Hunk observed.

"Those rocks, all of them, even the walls, have carvings. They all tell different stories, but they're all about a blue lion, and they all lead to some event happening last night. Something 'falling from the heavens' more or less."

Shiro followed up Lance's shot with a skid shot off the table next to the bin.

"That doesn't count, it hit the table first."

"It went in the bin, didn't it?"

"The wind blew it. Doesn't count."

Shiro shrugged. In some countries, a shot's a shot, but in others that just wasn't enough to cut it. "But first, I suppose I should thank you all for the rescue efforts... First Lieutenant Lance, right?"

"Big guy's Second Lieutenant Tsuyoshi Garrett, we all call him Hunk, plus that's his callsign. I'm Second Lieutenant Pat Gunderson, callsign Pidge. At your service." Handshakes ensued. Despite their body forms, Pidge had the strongest handshake of the three.

"So," Pidge continued, "anyone else make it out besides you?"

Shiro had that look again, but not for nearly as long. "I'm not sure. I remember the mission, I remember being captured, I remember being buttstroked by one of the alien's rifles… after that, just bits and pieces."

Pidge looked disappointed, and was about to voice their disappointment, when Hunk decided to address the purple shoe-shaped elephant in the room.

"Look, I'm sure you're tired, but you _did_ mention-slash-imply escaping from aliens, which I'm sure they're _very_ happy about - are they aware you escaped yet? Are they coming, say, here perhaps, possibly at this very moment en route to kill and-or enslave us all?"

That look again, another headshake. Keith drained his balled-up wrapper like Doctor J.

"I'd assume so, but I'm not sure. I remember they were searching for a 'Voltron', some sort of superweapon."

"Like Stonehenge?"

"I don't think so… but whatever it is, we need to find it before they do."

"Well," said Hunk as his bounced off the bin's lid - "don't worry I'll get it, but anyway, I was looking through Pat's stuff-"

"And who in the fuck gave you the right to do that?" asked the aforementioned Belkan with one eyebrow raised.

"-the 5D copy of Aces At War I lent you last week? Anyway, I was looking through his journal-"

"And who in the _fuck_ gave you the right to do _that?_ " asked the aforementioned Belkan with both eyebrows and voice raised.

"You hid the special features disc in there, anyway I noticed the repeating numbers the aliens were sending out looked like emission lines." At this, Pidge and Shiro looked to be fully aware of what he was talking about, Keith had a general idea, and Lance was lost.

"All right, I admit, I got a C in chemistry, but I was going for engineering physics anyway. What's an emission line?"

"It's a number describing the light emitted by an element or compound moving from high to low energy, except this compound doesn't exist anywhere on Earth. Which means either they're already here, or it's that Voltron they want. Given the time and parts, I could probably build a detector in a few hours." He fished a paper out of his pocket, with a jagged line running across its length.

"Here, I mapped out the wave… length…"

Hunk looked from the paper, to the photograph Keith had earlier pointed out, then back to the paper, then back to the photograph. He held the paper up next to the photograph from his field of vision, then again looked from one to the other, and other to one, and one to other again, and already he could not tell the difference. He grabbed a pin, and pinned it next to the photograph.

A perfect lineup with the set of rocks lining the lower edge of the cave.

"Well," welled Lance. "That's almost, but not quite, entirely unlike a coincidence if I've ever seen such a thing. How far is it to the Cherniy caves?"

"By car? About two hours."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 **Cherniy Cave System**

 **23km from the Yuktobanian Border**

 **3:57 Local Time**

The good thing that could be said about rocky deserts was that there usually wasn't enough sand to be any quantity of annoyance. Harder walking in the long run, but rocks could provide better shade than flat sands and low dunes. And dry - the Black Desert which occupied most of west-central Karabastan and straddled the Yuke border was the driest on Earth, with some areas not having received a drop of rain in centuries.

And it was because of this the five pilots traversed the distance between Larghar and the Cherniy caves in an old Yuke UAZ Patriot, modified with a hybrid engine system. A dinosaur, for sure, but it was cheap and reliable, and most importantly featured a working air conditioner that could handle even the extreme highs of the desert afternoon.

Keith drove, with Hunk in the passenger seat holding a homemade scintillation counter that looked remarkably like half a microwave forced into the space of a cracker box - the good kind of crackers, not the flavorless saltines that are only good slathered in peanut butter or cheese dip. It made an electronic _klick_ every second or so, having started a few minutes ago and slowly increasing in pace as they wandered off the beaten and paved path onto something that may have once been a road but was now mostly just level rock.

They rode in silence, more out of listening to the clicking of Hunk's device and a lack of radio stations out here in Nowhereland than lack of things to talk about. They had already brought Shiro (mostly) up to speed on Seianese and local politics (the capitalist renaissance was in full swing), military events (General Resource's private military had done A Thing and UPEO had to step in because they Did Not Approve), sports (Belka won the World Cup, making their sixth - Brasalium's pride, now ashes, had Pidge's permission to die; all in all the Belka vs Brasalium final was an even bigger thrill ride than the previous Cup's Osea vs Erusea which netted Osea their first ever), family, and other such things.

A bump, nearly sending Lance's thermos on a collision course with the Teethsburg Express, only to be blocked by his tongue.

"Jeez, Keith, watch where you're-"

The klicks changed from every second or so to every half-second briefly, before accelerating to a continuous drone-click as the little truck rounded a bend on the narrow road between a cliff and a deep place. There, occupying most of the cliff face, was the cave they had been searching for. The two remaining cliff walls spread out from the cave in a narrow U whose walls sloped down towards the canyons behind them. Below, descending from the mouth of the cave, drooled a stream that joined the many waters of several other, smaller openings below the cave to form a narrow river that would eventually join the Karab some ninety kilometers downstream. The path they were on narrowed slightly until it reached the cliff, forming a wide platform about the size of a small restaurant directly in front of the cliff's lower 'teeth', with the stream splitting it in half.

Pidge instinctively whipped out their camera and took a shot, decided the shutter speed wasn't high enough, and took another one. Years of practice held their hand steady, as did built-in stabilization features in her DSLR.

"Whoa."

Shiro nodded. "You can say that again."

Keith pulled up next to the largest of the 'teeth', which was conveniently the one nearest them on the side. As he claimed, carvings and paintings involving blue lions in some degree or another were on every tooth, and dotted the cliff faces near the entrance, some of them hundreds of meters up.

"What _are_ these?"

"These are the lion carvings I told you about. There's a lot more inside," said Keith as he stepped on a pebble and disembarked with the grace of a two-legged octopus. He dusted himself off as best as he could, and proceeded into the cave after making sure everyone else had silently agreed that they most definitely hadn't seen him nearly fall on his ass.

The stream obediently stayed in the middle of the cave, which was squarer on the inside than the outside made it look. It wasn't long before the five of them needed to break out their phones for the flashlights they came with. As they went further in, the lions and markings grew less painted and more carved, older, more primitive. Occasionally they'd see a bone or two, but they didn't look remotely human enough or recent enough to warrant concern.

"Like I said, they're everywhere in here."

Lance stood at something vaguely resembling attention, examining a particularly large engraving of a blue lion leaping in front of a circle - the Sun, perhaps? For a carving by what were obviously cavemen, it was an oddly perfect circle. He hmmed as he touched it, and in response it began to glow a brilliant sky blue. In response to _that_ , Lance yanked his hand back as if he'd stuck his hand on a running stove top.

"Holy sh- has that ever happened before?!"

Keith was wide eyed as the rest of them as he shook his head, which was all the answer he had time for, as the other carvings throughout the cave began to glow with equal intensity.

"Guys, I gotta bad feeling about thi-" said Shiro right before the floor collapsed. Five screaming pilots fell screaming into a natural flume into the earth below. The water had been merciful in ensuring it was a smooth ride, but they still fell down, down, fifty meters at the _minimum_ until it leveled out and spat them into a roughly circular chamber. Stalactites and stalagmites shut off all but the 'entrance' behind them, and they combined with openings and shiny sheets of rock to give the chamber the appearance of a cathedral.

But that wasn't what had caught the five pilots' attention.

 _That_ honor went to the enormous mechanical blue lion in the center of the chamber, surrounded by a force field. It was _enormous_ , the size of a small warship at some 150 meters from nose to tail. Damage, misuse, or perhaps time itself had chipped some of the paint in places, exposing silvery-white metal beneath. Its glowing golden eyes looked down on them, as if watching.

Pidge whipped out their camera again and took another photo.

"Is this the 'Voltron' I've been hearing about?" they asked, after picking their jaw up from the floor and wiping off the cave water.

"It _must_ be," said Shiro with total certainty. And why wouldn't he? Even a cursory glance could tell this thing could probably take on the entire military of a sizable country and win.

"Well it's definitely behind the energy," said Keith as he approached the force field. Strangely enough, force fields were only an experimental technology, despite the existence of railguns the size of skyscrapers, laser cannons that could fit on a wing pylon and still tear up tanks, and aircraft-mounted cloaking devices. And this one felt _strong_ , like the armor of a tank was strong. And… wet? Like a solid pool. Well whatever it was, this force field was well beyond the technology of Earth.

"Does anyone else get the feeling this thing is staring at 'em?" asked Lance as he and the others approached the force field. The other four responded in the negative as Keith attempted to find a way to push through the force field. No luck, it was as solid as it technically wasn't. Even attempting to scrape it with his knife proved fruitless - the blade wouldn't move a fraction of an inch into the force field. After hearing something rather like growling, Keith promptly stopped.

"C'mon, Keith, you're not Aurelian, you can't _force_ your way into a superweapon. You gotta knock."

And knock he did, three times in fact.

The lion let out a surprisingly unmechanical _roar_ as its engines whined to life and the force field dropped. Images filled their minds - Five lions, one of red, one of green, one of gold, one of blue, and one of black - flying in formation, their bodies aglow, to merge up into a gargantuan robot as tall as a skyscraper.

Lance could only blink.

"Well. Everyone saw that, right?"

"Voltron's a robot!" exclaimed Hunk like a kid who just saw a mecha anime for the first time. "Voltron's a huge, _huge badass fuckin' robot!_ "

"And this is just a leg," added Pidge. _Then where's the rest of 'em? If the Galra are spacefaring, it wouldn't make sense to keep them all on Earth, so…_

" _This_ is what they're looking for," added Shiro with absolute (and now truthful) certainty. "It has to be."

Obeying a silent command (or perhaps just programming), the enormous lion bowed its head towards the group, opening its mouth to reveal… an entryway. A convenient place considering the body plan of the robotic lion, and far less unfortunate than putting it in any of the other convenient places on the hip.

"Well _that_ was underwhelming," said Pidge as Lance practically ran up the steps that formed from the lower jaw's center.

The cockpit revealed itself to be spacious, but not nearly to the level of what one would expect for a vehicle this size - less the bridge of a cruiser and more a single-seat bridge for a small yacht. It was sleek, in the J J Abrams' Star Trek sense, but without being so blindingly white. Indeed, the cockpit was mostly grey with white, blue, and black accents in that order and a single grey-and-blue seat in the middle, resembling that of a sports car. The seat itself was on a slide system that allowed it to shift forward and backwards for active/inactive states, and side to side slightly to move with the G forces. Control appeared to be provided via a pair of sliding control grips. At the front was a set of holographic screens that rapidly shifted between a random set of alphabets and character systems before finally settling on the familiar Emmerian script used by most of the world in some capacity.

 _No visible ejection system… though it looks sturdy enough to handle anything Earth can throw at it… 'cept maybe Stonehenge._

Soon, however, a flaw was found in the cockpit's design. It was spacious enough to prevent all but the most paranoid pilots from becoming claustrophobic, but it was clearly designed for _one_ pilot and _one_ , at most four people, being in there at a time.

"Keith, move your hand or lose your hand."

"There's nowhere _else_ , Pat."

"Try your _pocket._ "

"Guys, shut up, I'm trying to figure out the controls of an _alien space lion robot leg._ " As if to punctuate the difficulty of his situation, he pushed a random 'button' (which soon revealed itself to be more like a phone's touchscreen) on the dashboard. The lion reared up on its rear legs and let out a roar, shaking the cave as if an enormous robot lion was roaring in it.

"Nope, that's the horn." A _thought_ passed through him. Not his own, but nor was it hostile, and it felt distinctly familiar yet not, and distinctly leoid. And there was only one lion in the area.

"Well that was helpful."

"Well _what_ was helpful," asked Keith in a less surprised/shocked tone than even he expected to have even at this point in their eventful day.

"So the lion talks, but not with words, more like ideas."

"Like a plane?"

"Well… no, that's more like an in depth version of feeling the road through the steering wheel. This is actual _communication_. But that's not important, what _is_ important is I know which button is the start button, and it's _this_ one!"

The lion let out another roar, but this time instead of just roaring it pushed itself off the ground and flew/ran (fran?) through the cavern, smashing against the stalactites and stalagmites in its path without noticeably slowing down. Pidge internally wept for the breathtaking views forever ruined.

She got a much better one when the lion burst out of the ground below the cave entrance and shot out into the sky, already accelerating past the sound barrier. To no-one's great surprise, Lance's immediate reaction upon breaching into the open air was to barnstorm like a nugget. Hunk's reaction to this was to blow chunks like a nugget. The lion took this vulgar disregard for interior sanitation quite well, and within seconds a small blue Roomba-like device popped out of a panel on the floor and cleaned it up, only just noticed by Pidge as the other pilots decried their larger Perfanesian comrade's lack of self-control when it came to giant burritos at Taco Giant.

"Seriously man," decried Pidge as Lance managed to put the lion in a _double_ frolov chakra without pulling it apart, " _Alka-Seltzer!_ "

"Well exc _uuuuuu_ se me for not realizing I was going to be joining the _Yuktobanian Circus_ today!"

"The Yukes don't have planes in their state circus, only the Belkans do."

"Whatever!" cried Hunk as another wave of nausea swept over him.

Slowly, and still prancing about like a freshly uncaged flying lion, Lance directed the Blue Lion in the general direction of the air base they had left that morning. If the Lion wasn't transmitting a friendly IFF, the base didn't react much, but then again according to Keith they were really the only ones here and all the base had was a couple of Yuke surface-to-air launchers from the seventies - two SA-6 Gainfuls and a SA-2 Guideline, which was only slightly more than nothing.

To the pilots in the Blue Lion, they may as well have been armed with pointed sticks and various pieces of fruit. To the Blue Lion, the base may as well have been undefended.

Which made it all the more curious when the controls of the Lion started to resist him, insisting on pulling up and away from the base.

"Something wrong, Tailor?"

"It's… not… it doesn't wanna land!"

"What do you _mean_ it doesn't want to land," said Pidge as if it was somehow surprising that a giant alien robot lion (that was also a leg) could have a will of its own. At this point in the day it was a wonder that anything was surprising to them, and it wasn't even time for dinner.

"I _mean_ it doesn't wanna land! Hang on, here-"

He let the controls go, and the Lion charged up, up, and away, already entering the stratosphere. A rectangular display formed in the 'HUD', displaying an intimidatingly massive purple ship that looked a bit like a battleaxe with a stealth bomber strapped to its butt. Shiro shivered like a child in an R-rated horror film theatre.

"It's them. They're here."

"The, what'd you call them… Galra?"

Shiro nodded, as Hunk paled at his response. A second display popped up providing a three-dimensional map of the Earth and the extremely near things between it and the Moon. The display zoomed in on the Galra ship and drew a bright red line from its bow down to Earth - a line that headed straight for the Lion.

A third display - Galaxy Garrison, the IUN's space military branch, was already beginning to prep R-352 Sepias to intercept the vessel above the Comona Islands, and the mighty 120-centimeter cannons of Stonehenge began to rotate towards the target. Even the Arsenal Birds and the rebuilt Aigaions, Kottosses, and Gyges were moving closer to the intercept point. Across the Usean continent, planes were starting to scramble in an attempt to greet this ship, with the olive branch or the sword.

Shiro shook his head. That much firepower could have stopped the Razgriz, Mobius One, and Scarface all at once, but an interstellar warship? He wasn't sure. Not without Voltron, or at least without some serious assistance.

"Your orders, captain?"

That was a shock. Lance in srs bsns mode. Pidge and Hunk had both heard that mode of Lance only once, and that was four months ago when rebel Sotoan forces held a nuclear power plant. That was a _messy_ situation all around, and they had both expected Lance's casualness towards everything to bork it up, but somehow he pulled through and got the rebels to calm down enough to listen to reason.

"Lance?"

"You're the ranking officer, Shiro. Your call."

The choice was obvious. Still, it required no small amount of deliberation. He was the only one with experience with this enemy, and while the others (yes, even Keith who was just a FAIP) had all seen the elephant so to speak, he was the only one to have seen this particular elephant, and he was the only one to have passed UPEO's starfighter course - Keith dropped out, Lance was dropped for being too reckless, Hunk the opposite, and Pidge was expelled for hacking the facility computers to give themselves 100% grades.

"That ship is going against the full weight of UPEO and the continent of Usea. Even so, I don't feel comfortable letting them deal with the Galra on their own."

"Lance, your orders are to intercept and assist them with the efforts."

And back came Lance's usual Lance-ness.

"Alright. We're hunting aliens tonight, Corsairs."

 **an:** This chapter struggled with me for a long arsed time. It was supposed to come out mid September, but oh well.

Hunk says that the numbers were Fraunhofer lines in the actual Voltron canon, but that didn't make much sense to me, because Fraunhofer lines are caused by elements in the atmosphere of stars, which the Blue Lion clearly isn't. Emission lines, however, are emitted by just about anything when going from a high to low energy state. Also, it really is strange that none of the Ace Combat games have force fields, not even Ace Combat 3 - and Ace Combat 3 has starfighters and planes wielding lasers capable of splitting floating cities in half! Maybe the nations of Strangereal believe that such technology is a waste of time with such a high level of automatization in both manufacturing and military. 'Seen the Elephant' is an American phrase that means having seen combat that used to be common and has recently started to come back. I like it so much I've decided to try and bring it back.

 **5D:** Five-Dimensional (Disc), a disc type IRL currently under development using nanoscale scratches called 'nanograting' to store data in glass discs. With a shelf life measured in billions of years, and able to store hundreds of terabytes of data in a disc the size of a Blu-Ray, I imagine these will replace both Blu-Ray and the Archival Discs Sony is developing by the 2040s both in our world and in the Ace Combat world.


	4. III: Stone of Change

**disclaimer:** took you bloody long enough.

 **an:** i do _not_ need to hear this from the likes of you.

 **disclaimer:** you needed to hear it from _someone_ , may as well be me

 **an:** just… just do the thing.

 **Disclaimer:** Ace Combat is property of Project Aces and Bandai-Namco Entertainment, Inc; Voltron: Legendary Defender is property of DreamWorks Animation, WEP, and Studio Mir. The author owns none of these.

* * *

 **? ? ? ? ?**

 **? ? ? ? ?, ? ? ? ? ?**

 **June 23, 2041**

A man stood in the center of a dark, empty room.

Well, 'man' would be a stretch of the term. Firstly, the man was no mere man - he was a king, and while his head bore no crown, his futuristic white and gold armor, his beard, and the way he held himself were clearly royal. Secondly, he was no human - pointed ears, V-shaped blue marks beneath and to the sides of his blue eyes, clearly alien in appearance. Were it not for those, however, one would be forgiven for thinking he was simply an old gentleman of eastern Sotoan heritage.

Thirdly, and this was the most important, he was a hologram. His entire body made of photons constrained to place by sufficiently analyzed magic (and magnetism), which gave him a bit of a blue tinge. It matched well with the whites, pale blues, and blacks that dominated the room's color scheme.

"System diagnostics log, one zero six five… weapon systems online, environmental control system online… warp systems at only seventy nine percent efficiency? What's our fuel level?"

Silence, as computers and systems checked their cameras within what was apparently a starship to check the unnamed king's question.

"That low… we shall have to schedule a stop at a Balmera immediately upon reactivation of the Lions, if not the first flight then the second. Who among the crew is remaining?"

A second three-dimensional hologram appeared before the king, this one depicting a circle of pods, each large enough to hold one person. Of these, most were grey and colorless, but two next to each other were the same blue as the king.

"My daughter… and of course, my advisor, Coran. Well, if there's any Alteans left who can make repairs, he can. He and his father did design this ship, after all. Very well, scan for the Lions."

The room exploded with points and swirls of light scattered throughout, forming a three dimensional map of the universe, before splitting into four 'sections' that zoomed in on individual portions of the cosmos, with six lights brighter than the others - green, red, yellow, blue, violet, and white. Violet and white were on top of each other, green and yellow were close enough to be in the same section, but red and blue…

"The Red Lion has been captured? Make that priority two - once we have the fuel to pursue it, recapturing the Red Lion is of the utmost importance. And the blue lion… wait. Zoom in on that planet."

The blue dot expanded, filling the king's view as it turned from a blue dot to a blue ball to a blue-green planet, with a blue dot flying across its surface to the night side. Above the planet's surface, approaching from a different direction, a violet ship.

A _Galra_ ship.

"Change of plans. Prepare for takeoff, and warp to the Blue Lion's location as soon as we are out of atmosphere. I do not care if this ship runs out of power for anything but the cryopods, we _cannot_ let the Blue Lion be captured."

The king vanished as lights and systems throughout the ship went down, every last drop of power it had being transmitted to either the engines or the cryopods. The king may have been just a memory compiled to code, but he was still self-aware enough to think there was a good chance this little jaunt would be the ship's last for some time.

 **Scofield Plateau**

 **Southeastern Usea**

 **June 23, 2041**

 **1:03 AM**

By the time the Lion had reached the point of atmospheric entry of the Galra ship, the shooting had already begun. From the radio chatter, it was apparent that the Galra had started it when they shot down the UPEO ambassador's plane, and from there all Hell had broken loose.

 _ **«Titan 2 is hit, repeat, Titan 2 is hit.»**_

 _ **«Titan 2, bail out, you're no good in that condition.»**_

 _ **«Bastards! Fucking aliens!»**_

 _ **«Quit bitchin' and keep shooting at them! Maintain pressure! Stonehenge, where's our support?!»**_

 _ **«At current speed, enemy vessel will be within range in fifteen minutes.»**_

 _ **«AWACS, how long until it reaches direct engagement range?»**_

 _ **«Thirty seconds! Crux to all units, fire at will on my mark…»**_

"They haven't noticed us yet?" said an incredulous Lance. It was a… somewhat hypothetical question. The Galra ship was barely in the atmosphere and it was already forming a hairball around itself below. Up to this point, only the interceptors and the Neucom Emergency Unit's Remora fighters were firing upon it, only they had the range and service ceiling to do so.

"Probably too busy with the Galra," replied Shiro in a dropping tone - even as he spoke, the Galra ship began a slow turn to face the Blue Lion. If there was any doubt what its target was, it was gone now.

 _ **«Mark!»**_

Missiles, rockets, and lasers by the hundreds rose up to meet the ship as they came up from the airships, the fighters, and the tanks and missile launchers on the surface. For a second Lance thought he saw a few ballistic missiles, but at this range with allied presence being this dense even a non-nuclear ballistic missile would do more harm than good.

The Galra warship's violet energy shield flickered momentarily from the heavy assault, and the ship itself shook, but both held.

In the midst of this chaos, the UPEO forces finally noticed the blue lion.

 _ **«Unidentified aircraft, you are in combat airspace, please- wait, the hell?»**_

 _ **«It's a giant cat!»**_

 _ **«Hey look, it's Blade Liger!»**_

 _ **«Crux to unidentified… aircraft, please state your callsign and intent.»**_

"Good question, Shiro. What _is_ our callsign?"

"Didn't you say it was Corsair?"

The three Corsair squadron pilots shook their heads, with Pidge being the one to answer. "Can't. Technically we're doing dereliction of duty as members of that squadron, and as useful as this thing probably is it probably won't do us any good to just say 'Hey, we're mercenaries that abandoned our post to find a giant robot lion and rescue a guy from the black helicopters!'" All of this was said with a healthy amount of deadpan.

"Okay, then ideas?"

"Leo?" Hunk's suggestion.

"Too obvious."

"Azure?" Shiro's.

"Same reason."

"Zoid? One of the pilots did call us Blade Liger." Pidge.

"Callsigns have to be easy to pronounce, one, and if they're a reference they have to be common knowledge, next."

Ultimately it was Keith who would provide the choice they could all agree on for their callsign.

"Paladin?"

"Cool!"

"Sounds good."

"A bit stuffy but I like it"

"Yeah, that'll work."

 _ **«This is Paladin Actual, here to provide support. Paladin Actual to Crux, I have vital information regarding that ship and its intentions.»**_

 _ **«Crux to Paladin, go ahead.»**_

 _ **«That ship is a vessel of a nation known as the Galra Empire, a violently expansionist nation-state that, as you can probably guess, has more than a few worlds under its belt, most of which were taken by force. They were the ones that captured the members of the Kerberos Mission, and if you want proof I have Captain Shirogane here to prove it.»**_

 _Pause for effect…_

 _ **«Listen up - that ship is after this lion, which is just one part of a superweapon. I don't think anyone here needs a history lesson as to why letting them have even a part of a superweapon is a bad idea.»**_

Another pause, this one not for effect but out of shock and surprise as the rest of the allied forces soaked in the information they had just been given. All while continuing to fire on the Galra ship's shields, which continued to hold even against the punishment it was receiving.

 _ **«Understood. That actually makes things easier. All right, Paladin, I'll give you the briefing then.»**_

 _ **«Whatever this ship is, 'Galra' or otherwise, it's hostile and needs to be destroyed. UPEO command's plan was simple - shepherd this ship with as much firepower as possible into Stonehenge's maximum accuracy range, over the Chopinburg Rainforest. Once there, Stonehenge will be used to knock out its shields in one hit, and force it to land so that ground forces in the area can capture it. With your information, we can speed the process along.»**_

 _ **«You'll be acting as bait. If this Galra ship wants your lion so badly, it'll have to follow. Try and see if you can find out where the shield generators are. Command said we could do without those, but they want the rest of the ship as intact as we can manage.»**_

This was a horrible idea. A dreadful idea! A dangerous, foolish, stupid idea! After all if they had spaceships there was a good chance they knew what a railgun was, and could defend against it!

Of course their ship probably wasn't designed to handle _anti-asteroid_ railguns, let alone eight at once, and this lion _was_ part of an alien superweapon, too…

Well. What a conundrum Lance faced on this fine summer night.

 _ **«Understood. Has anyone figured out their radio frequency?»**_

 _ **«Negative. Ambassador Sisko's message was broadcast on all channels, as per protocol, and the vessel only responded by shooting down his plane.»**_

 _ **«Pity.»**_ _No fun being the bait unless you can goad 'em on, after all._

Lance got the typical feral grin he sported whenever he was about to do something that was both incredibly ballsy and incredibly stupid. Hunk was the first to notice, and sighed.

"Oh boy, here we go."

Keith managed out a "Wha-" before Lance pulled the Blue Lion into a steep swan dive to the plateau floor below, rocketing along the ground at well over Mach 1 before popping up directly in front of the Galra ship, narrowly avoiding a collision.

" _Catch me if you can, fuckers~"_ howled Lance (not on the radio, of course, that would be a gross breach of radio etiquette and protocols) as the Lion fired a laser into the ship's shield before turning towards the Chopinburg rainforest to the northwest. This did substantially more damage than either of the first two volleys, but still the shields held.

 _Tougher than you look, aint'cha?_

 **Chopinburg Rainforest**

 **Southern Usea**

 **June 23, 2041**

 **3:03 AM**

Three hours had passed, and the Galra ship had sustained barely any more damage than it had entering the atmosphere. The conditions of its shields were another matter entirely. Six successive waves of fighters and interceptors, occasionally backed up by land and water-based anti-air batteries (Scrambling an entire air force's worth of jets was easy, scrambling an army's worth of anti-air, not so much) had battered the shield to the point that cracks could be seen in the chevronesque network of panels that made up the vessel's shielding. At times, a few of the panels broke completely, allowing a missile or two to get through, or even the Lion's laser (which had done most of the breaking), but never enough to do serious damage. To make matters worse, the Galra clearly had a good grasp of both fire control and damage team tactics, so what damage had been done was already being repaired mid-battle.

That was the bad news. The good news was that there was enough firepower and tonnage here that, one way or another, the ship _would_ go down over Chopinburg. Two Arsenal Birds, two _Aigaion_ -class aerial carriers, four _Gyges_ -class anti-air aerial cruisers, and four _Kottos_ -class aerial jamming cruisers. All of the _Aigaion_ , _Gyges_ , and _Kottos_ line were of the black Mark IV variety and equipped with air defense lasers similar to the ones on the FALKEN line.

And that wasn't even mentioning the metaphorical wall of Neucom, UPEO, and General Resources fighters in the air. Indeed, there was enough firepower here to take out most of the world's air forces. The best they could muster were here - The Stonehenge defense squadron's X-49 Night Ravens, commonly nicknamed the 'Batplane', NEU's XR-900 Geopelias, and of course the General Resources' Air Strike Force Aurora fighters.

Hopefully it'd be enough to take down one ship. It would have to be enough to take down one ship.

 _ **«Crux to all forces,»**_ stated Crux as he mentally thanked God, Zeus, and various other deities he could think of that the E-6 Sentinel was supersonic, _**«begin the assault. That ship must not leave this airspace. Crux to Paladin, do you have the firing solution?»**_

 _ **«Five more minutes! Gimme five minutes and I'll have it,»**_ was Lance's response.

 _ **«When you get it, send it to Stonehenge and guide the ship to these coordinates.»**_

 _ **«Understood.»**_

 _ **«Everyone, you know the plan. All units, engage! Kottos units, Mirage squadron, activate ECM!»**_

With a single word of command, the shield of the Galra ship was struck by dozens of lasers, from the Geopelias, the Night Ravens, the _Aigaions_ , the _Gyges_ , and of course the Blue Lion. Holes formed momentarily in the barrier, but only long enough for a handful of missiles and lasers to get through. Still, it was enough to slow the ship down and take out a few of its guns, for a few minutes at least. The vessel retaliated with violet beams of its own, but whatever it was using to lock on to targets was clearly unable to handle the sheer volume of false data being fed to it by the jammer squadrons in the air, and the accuracy of its lasers plummeted.

Jets and lasers and missiles lit up the sky as the forces of Earth (or at least Usea) did battle with the ship in what from a distance seemed an almost artistic dance of death, but from within was frantic chaos that maintained order solely because there was only one target.

From above, below, and the sides the ship was hammered with laser and missile fire, occasionally being enough to penetrate through the shields but never enough to do lasting damage. All the while Lance looped and flipped the Blue Lion around less than a kilometer from the vessel's prow, luring it ever so slowly towards a flat, empty patch of land that used to be the site of one of Neucom's nanotech research plants. Now surrounded by enough anti-air and infantry to capture a Super Star Destroyer.

 _ **«It's in range! Cavalier team, Hussar team, Dauphin team, open fire!»**_

The Galran ship may very well have caught on to the UPEO and allied forces' plans well before the SAMs began to fire. Indeed, if they could build a spaceship, they probably knew damn well what was going on. But with the punishing fire from all sides, the air resistance of the lower atmosphere, and the two ridges on either side of the field, there was simply no way or where to turn to avoid the incoming fire from below. All it could do was take the beating to its shields, which finally began to fail.

 _ **«Keep firing! The bastard's starting to break!»**_

 _ **«It better be, it's been two hours!»**_

Blind and wounded, the ship was indeed beginning to break, physically and psychologically. Its movements slowed to a stop near the center of the field as it shifted as much power as it could to the shields, clearly intending to metaphorically hole itself and wait for its assailants to run out of ammunition. In its haste to protect itself, it revealed its hand - energy flow from the shield generators to the shields was so great that the Blue Lion's sensors could pick it up plain as day.

It was exactly where it was needed to be.

 _ **«Located! Paladin Actual, commencing data link to Stonehenge targeting system!»**_

Hundreds of kilometers away, eight massive guns rotated to lock onto a target larger than an airplane for the first time in half a century. Less than twenty kilometers away, hundreds of aircraft formed into three groups on the starboard side of the ship, forming a triangle with just enough room to fly the fist of God through the middle.

 _ **«Firing solution received. Rotating cannons now.»**_

Whether the Galra were uninterested in the communications of the human war machine or simply uncaring was unknown, but they were quick enough to catch on to the plot now. Alas, they would make their second mistake. Instead of attempting to run, they simply shifted still more power to the shields, and put all of the shielding on the starboard side, in an attempt to hold off whatever the humans were planning.

 _ **«Rotation complete. Firing.»**_

 _ **«Stonehenge impact in two minutes, all units fire on target on my mark...»**_

 _Come on, just hold still like an idiot for two minutes…_

To keep the ruse going, the fighters continued a series of lazy loops and turns, firing at random positions on the shields but always returning to the same orientation in sequence - that is, with their noses dead-on towards the ship's shield generators near the rear of the ship. It wasn't a ruse that would last long, but it would last long enough.

 _ **«Impact in ten, nine, eight, seven…»**_

 _ **«Six, five, missiles away…»**_

Hundreds of missiles from above and below streaked from the sky and ground towards a single target. Their intent was obvious, but the Galra ship could only divert power from shields to the engines so quickly, and the commander wisely decided to keep it in the shields to prevent as much damage as possible.

Wise were Stonehenge not attacking. His third, and final, mistake.

 _ **«Three, two, one, mark!»**_

The Stonehenge Turret Network, located in a desert a few hundred kilometers north of Axel Bay, was a circle of eight gargantuan one hundred and twenty centimeter cannons constructed in the 1990s. It was restored to working order in the 2030s with updated computers and materials, increasing its range from twelve hundred kilometers to eighteen hundred kilometers. Each of the eight cannons fired a shell that weighed as much as an eighteen wheeler (and was nearly as tall) at a speed of six kilometers per second, propelled initially by gunpowder and then by electromagnets - thus it was not a 'true' railgun like Chandelier, despite being called as such. These shells could be modified to contain conventional explosives, thermobaric warheads, nuclear warheads, shaped charge nuclear warheads, shaped charge thermobaric warheads (which were used against the Ulysses asteroid due to fears that nuclear shaped charge warheads would simply result in a rain of radioactive meteors), and uranium-tungsten-carbide sabots, the latter three being designed for use against bunkers.

The missiles and lasers, collectively, hit over the span of less than a second at a single spot on the Galra ship's shield, tearing a hole just large enough to let in eight UTC sabots strike the ship with the equivalent energy of a tactical atom bomb in a circular spread some four feet across. The ships of the Galran fleet were tough, but a simple light cruiser such as the one UPEO faced that night in June was not meant to handle that kind of concentrated firepower, and eight uranium tungsten carbide sabots went in the starboard side and out the port, obliterating the shield generators, the training deck, and parts of the upper stern galley.

Flame and sparks belched from the two new holes as steel and metal boiled. The violet lights of the ship's windows and marking lights went dead as the power system went into shock from the stress of having a major component atomized by eight thick rods. The crew rushed to repair the damages and shift power to the stalled engines, but with less than a thousand meters between them and the ground there just wasn't enough room to stop their descent.

With the thunderous roar of an earthquake and the dying-animal screech of crushing metal, the Galra ship came to a violent landing on the fields of the Chopinburg Rainforest at 3:10 in the morning on June the 23 of the year two thousand and forty-one as marked by the Erusean calendar.

 _ **«Crux to ground forces, begin the final phase of the operation. Remember, the goal is to capture as many of the enemy as we can, and get the ship under our control in as few pieces as possible.»**_

 _ **«Understood.»**_

Tanks moved slowly inwards towards the small depression the ship had made, instep with hundreds of infantry - a fair amount special forces, but mostly just from the Erusean, United Usean, and Neucom defense forces. Out of the dust, a handful of scattered units of what could only be Galra troops - some in full body armor and some not - rushed out to meet them, but they had neither the numbers or coordination to put up a fight for long.

This didn't mean the fighting was calm. What Galra did rush out to fight were damned determined to not let the Earth forces get their hands on the ship, but there was something off about the way many of them fought. Sure there was a chance they were just unfamiliar with the environment, but there was more to it than that - they fought with no imagination, no ingenuity, like a drone programmed to respond to stimuli in a set way. Even the ones that were clearly not machines fought with a little _too_ much discipline, for the first few minutes at least.

But the human forces had numbers, and the Galra had injured, and by four o'clock what Galra troops had survived were beginning to surrender.

 _ **«Crux?»**_

 _ **«Go ahead.»**_

 _ **«This is Crusader Actual. The last of the crew has surrendered. The ship's ours.»**_

Cheers filled the radio. Lance smiled at the others with a smug, but relieved, grin. Whatever these Galra were, they could be beaten. It was only two hours, but it was a long as hell two hours at this time of night, and the victory was well-won.

 _ **«All right. Galaxy Garrison says they'll have some engineers ready to examine the ship in a few-»**_

 _ **«Warning! Warning! Satellites just picked up an unknown energy reading.»**_

Lance barely had the time to think 'Where' before the Lion's controls jerked out of his hands. As he was rubbing them, the Lion's head shot up and the body followed with it on a rapid course towards the heavens above.

"Lance?!"

"It's… Hunk, help me out here, the controls are stuck!"

Hunk and Shiro both put their weight into wrestling the controls away from whatever had possessed the Lion, but to no avail - either they were truly jammed or the Lion wasn't taking no for an answer. Pidge and Keith tried to assist, but the limited room didn't provide enough leverage to do much good. Not that it would have mattered.

 _ **«Where is- directly above us?!»**_

 _ **«Crux to Galaxy Garrison, can you identify the reading?»**_

 _ **«It's… it's another ship! Unidentified vessel, you are in a restricted airspace, please state your intent-»**_

 _ **«Paladin Actual, Paladin Actual, stand down, you are on a direct course to-»**_

 _ **«Paladin to Crux, I can't! The lion- controls not responding!»**_

 _ **«What?»**_

 _ **«Whatever that thing is, the Lion wants to go towards it. I… I don't think it's hostile!»**_

"Lance, how the _hell_ do you know that?" asked an incredulous Pidge as a white and blue ship loomed into the viewscreen before them. It was shaped rather like a cross between the old Excalibur superweapon from the Belkan war and a Coke bottle.

Whatever response Crux had planned for Lance was cut off as the Lion simply accelerated faster towards the white ship, disappearing in a door that opened as it approached.

Jets that had been on their way home moments before suddenly turned as one towards the new vessel, weapons at the ready.

 _ **«Hold fire! I repeat, ALL UNITS, HOLD FIRE-»**_

At last, this ship chose to communicate.

 _ **«Forces of the planet Earth… this is the Altean battleship of the**_ **Castle** _ **-class**_ **Arcen Lyonez** _ **.»**_

 _ **«We are not hostile. We request clearance to land… and an audience.»**_

* * *

 **an:** I always found calling the _ship_ 'Castle of Lions' was a bit awkward, and 'Castle-ship' was too informal - it is a _warship_ and if it's going to have a phrase name it should have a name like those used by the Covenant in Halo, or the Imperium of Man, which 'Castle of Lions' is neither. So I made one up. Pity that the Altean 'language' is clearly there for flavor text and not an organized, structured language like Klingon. But well, Voltron lore isn't as srs bsns as Star Trek lore, is it? Easy for kids to understand, hard for us writefriends to make fics based on.

Regardless. You may be wondering why the Useans have so much firepower, or perhaps why the Aigaions are still in the air. To that I point out that many of the larger US Navy ships are from the 1970s and 1980s. Sure the Aigaions are getting long in the tooth, but they're still viable. And the Arsenal Birds would only be a little over a decade or so old at this point. As for why Neucom and General Resources don't have any? They didn't have any in Ace Combat 3, so I'm guessing aircraft of that size are the kind that the governments of the world still have enough power to prevent them from buying. Or building.


	5. IV: Castle Ship

**an:** miraculously, this may actually go up close to on time this time!

 **disclaimer:** incredible - you're lying again!

 **an:** no, i actually intended to wait until may this time. so yes, it's on bloody time. chill and do your thing. Edit: Hahahaha I am trash

 **disclaimer:** Ace Combat is property of Project Aces and Bandai-Namco Entertainment, Inc; Voltron: Legendary Defender is property of DreamWorks Animation, WEP, and Studio Mir. The author owns none of these.

* * *

 **Arcen Leonis**

 **75,000 feet above Chopinburg Rainforest**

 **June 23, 2041**

 **3:25 AM Local Time**

"Pat, take point."

The short Belkan turned their head around and gave Lance, their de facto (formerly de jure) commanding officer a raised eyebrow instead of fully responding. They were now in what appeared to be the atrium/foyer/hangar/whatever of the large white ship that had appeared above Chopinburg shortly after the destruction of the 'Galran' ship, and after being deposited on the ground by the Blue Lion (and after it had quite noisily roared, shaking the ship and scaring the hell out of Hunk), that was the first word any of them had said besides 'Clear'. Unlike those outside the ship, they had not heard the radio communications it had made to the Earth forces.

"Well mister threads-the-needle, are you sure you want the person with the worst eyesight and the worst submachine gun aim here taking point?"

"Well, you being point makes you closer to the enemies."

"So? I have an MP7-"

"We all have PDWs, Pidge, I think we know."

"I still got the worst handgun and PDW accuracy in training. Make Hunk-"

"I'd rather not."

An awkward pause was had. "Yeah that's probably a good idea," decided Lance. "Shiro, why don't you-"

"I don't have any guns," he said, "and before any of you hand me yours, I just… ehh… I just don't like using any guns that aren't my own."

"Understandable."

Keith huffed, drawing an MP7 of his own. " _I'll_ take point. I'm the only one with ground forces training, right?"

The Corsair pilots shrugged. "Technically I do too," said Hunk, "buuut…"

"Right. Follow me, then."

As soon as he took a single step however, the lights directly above them came on, casting them all in a column of light outlined by the circular array above and a rhombus in a rhombus below them. Gibberish came out in a commanding but not uncaring tone from hidden speakers within the ceiling as smaller columns of light enveloped the five, scan lines moving up their body and slowing just a bit over their skulls.

 _ **[[Identities confirmed. Languages downloaded. Confirmed presence of Paladins.]]**_

First to speak was Pidge, who started almost as soon as it finished.

"Did the ship just talk in Belkan?"

"No? That was definitely Sapinic."

"Pretty sure that was Perfanesian, Lance - though it did have an Osean accent for some reason."

"I heard Seianese."

"I heard Ose-"

"All right, we get it, Mullet," interrupted Lance, "it's speaking in all our languages at once… somehow."

"Who are you?" called out Shiro to the computer. "Why did you have the Lion come here? What relation do you have to the Galra?"

Silence was his first answer, but soon the rest of the atrium came into view, lit up by vaguely flame-like swirls of white light that coalesced into futuristic lights centered two-thirds of the way up the tall, thin panels that made up the walls. Before them, a staircase that went up one level before splitting in a T and going up another level in either direction. However, only the path straight ahead continued to light up.

Lance let out a low whistle. "Alright. We're going that way, I guess."

"Are you sure? For all we know, this could be a trap."

"Uh, well," said Hunk to the surprise of all there, "if they have a spaceship, they control a giant robot cat - with as much firepower as a whole _squadron_ of our starfighters, no less - _and_ can scan our brains fast enough to decipher out our languages and speak them perfectly, why would they bother with traps? I mean, they have the same kind of firepower the Lion seems to have, there isn't a whole lot we can do to stop 'em from doing whatever they want. For all we know we could already be neck-deep in their trap."

Keith sighed.

"Fuck it. May as well, since I don't think any of us brought night vision…?" Shaken heads. "Right. We'll go this way."

And on the five went, leaving the Lion behind them. They did not see it, but not long after they left that atrium a panel descended and the Lion passed through the floor and on to its designated hangar. They only barely felt it, but about twenty minutes into their long walk the ship began to move, slowly descending towards the Los Canas airbase, where it would touch down vertically, and the four engine nacelles spread out to the landing pattern - they barely noticed the shift in gravity when the ship tilted forward, and noticed it even less when its nose went back to vertical in order to land.

The minutes grew to almost an hour. As they walked, the ship lit up corridor after corridor, steering them deeper into the ship while passing none of the control centers or hangars. Twice they passed crew and pilot quarters, and once a sizable galley, which Hunk had to be pulled away from to break him out of his awe at the massive variety of pristine, beyond-human-quality equipment.

Just as they were starting to get sick of walking (just because three Air Force pilots, one trainer, and one space-certified Galaxy Garrison pilot can walk for hours on end up and down stairs doesn't mean they want to), the lights at last brought them to their 'destination'. A round room with eight massive vertical… the best description would be 'futuristic sarcophagi with no faces', with a raised round platform that had a continued path in four directions. In the circle were eight circular panels, and in the exact center, facing to the paladin's left, was a lectern-like control panel in the same whites and greys of the rest of the ship. The panel itself was roughly crescent-shaped, with two black parts on the ends that took up about a third of the surface, each with two smaller, grey panels - one small one large. In the lower middle was a black hexagon, stretched slightly to the vertical, which glowed as Pidge approached it. Below the control panel itself was a glassy circle in the same blue as most of the other accent lights on board the ship. Which was also the same color as the engine accents, come to think of it.

"What is this, a mausoleum," asked Lance as he stared up at one of the sarcophagus-like structures. It must have been at least ten meters tall, give or take a few inches.

"Could be equipment," Shirou said.

"For what, an armory?" A hiss was heard, as two of the circular panels slid out of sight and two cryogenic storage pods rose from the floor below, steam gushing from the open holes, until stopped by the base of the pods plugging the holes airtight.

"Or a sickbay," mumbled Pidge as the first of the two pods 'opened' - or rather, its glass lid seemed to just dissolve into nothing. Within was what could best be described as a dark elf, but with skin a more humanoid shade of off-chocolate rather than the typical charcoal grey of dark elves in fantasy. Her hair was puffy and white, hanging almost down to the knees, ice blue eyes, and pinkish chevrons facing down and out at the peak of each cheekbone, just below her eyes. She wore a thin gold diadem, violet earrings and a floor-length blue and white dress with gold accents as she fell limply forward with a cry for her father, only to be caught by Lance.

After catching her breath, she turned those big blue eyes up towards Lance, which caused no small amount of blushing from the Sapinian. "Who are you? Where am I?" Her accent was a surprisingly cultured Received Pronunciation, not unlike the royal family of North Point.

And Lance, being Lance, could not resist the urge to be Lance and do a Lance thing at that moment, one which did not really lend itself to one being Lancey. But Lance was Lance, and it was the nature of the Lance to be Lancey, so Lancey he was.

"I'm Lance, and you're right here in my arms," he said in an attempt at seduction, which would have worked if the alien in his arms wasn't looking suspiciously at every thing in the room, before turning her eyes towards Lance's ears.

"Your ears," she half-muttered, staring up at the auditory orifices in question.

This was clearly not the response Lance was expecting, though you had to give him credit for at least trying to roll with it. "...yeah, what about them?" Isn't he great, folks? Let's give him a big hand for trying, thank you Lance.

He was far less prepared for what she followed it with.

"They're hideous. What's _wrong_ with them?"

"Nothing's wrong with 'em," Lance said defensively, "they heard exactly what yEEEEE-" His statement in defense of his round and non-knifey ears was rudely interrupted by this elf woman grabbing him by the ear and spinning him around, forcing him into a kneeling position - even when the other pilots drew their guns on her, she did not relent - partly because she had a convenient meat shield, partly because she wasn't intimidated, partly because she really had no intention of harming him any more than he was being harmed at that point. Yet.

"Who are you? Where is King Alfor? What are you doing on my castle ship - more than that, _how_ did you get on board?"

"God, pull a little harder-"

She did. "Answer the question!"

"Agghhh… fine, fine! A giant blue robot lion brought us here after your ship showed up on our planet after we blew up a giant purple spaceship, that's all we know!"

"What?" In her incredulousness, the woman had let go of Lance, but seemed only marginally more calm. "How do _you_ have the Blue Lion? What happened to its Paladin. Unless-" Realization crossed her face, and it was clear she wished it hadn't.

"What year is it?"

None of the humans had an answer for that, but Shiro at least had the diplomatic skill to say something (as did Lance, though he was busy whining about his ear at that time.)

"We… don't know what you're talking about. Look, maybe if you tell us who you are, or at least a little of what you _think_ is going on, we might be able to help."

The woman stood a bit taller, prouder, as she cleared her throat and shook her head to clear her mind a little of the panic that still lingered.

"I am Princess Allura of the Planet Altea, capital of the Altean Kingdoms. I have to find out where we are, how long we've been asleep in the cryochambers…"

She gently (sorta) nudged Pidge aside to get at the control panel, placing her hands on the black parts. When she did so, the grey parts and the hexagon glowed the same blue as the glassy circle below, and a bluish-white holographic screen/keyboard combination manifested at an angle above the hexagon.

"So that's how it works," said Pidge to no-one. _What is with this ship and blue? Do Alteans only have three colors on their warships?_

As they thought those thoughts and as Allura worked on the control panel, the second cryochamber opened, revealing a tall, ginger-haired Altean with a pseudo-mullet, sideburns, a very turn-of-the-century moustache, brown eyes, and the same facial markings as Allura, only in teal instead of violet. With a gasp and a cry of something in Altean, he wasted no time missing Lance by a mile with a flying kick and narrowly avoiding faceplanting into Allura's cryopod, saving himself with a cry of 'Quiznak'. Which took very little imagination on the pilot's part to deduce a meaning from.

"You're lucky I've got a case of cryopod legs," he said in a somehow less _and_ more cultured North Point accent. "Otherwise I'd have you in a sleeper hold and out before you could say 'Alfor'!"

"That so, old man?" Probably not the best choice of words in a potentially diplomatic situation, but Lance was a pilot, and the ability to brag was a requirement. "Well before you got to that, I'd duck under you, grab your arms like so, and drop you like a bomb!"

"Old- oh yeah? Well how could you do that when I've already come at you with a neck chop like-"

It was clear from Allura's face that she was trying very hard to ignore the two's measuring contest, and doing a poor job of it. Clearly she wasn't the aviation sort, or perhaps Altea didn't have such a culture in its military. Though that wouldn't explain Moustache Guy.

"You'd think he'd stop eventually," said Hunk in a vaguely successful attempt to sooth Allura's nerves, "but no, no he keeps going until someone stops him." She paused, her hands retreating for a moment from the holographic keyboard, before returning to type away at it, with greatly increased fervor.

"That's not.. That's not possible…"

"What is it, Your Majesty," asked Coran, who had changed from banting with Lance to professional in an instant.

"We've been asleep… for ten _thousand_ years!"

Her arms gripped the control panel tightly, as if a memory was passing through her. A tense moment later, and she was back in the present, calming herself slightly with a weak sigh.

"Altea, our civilization, our system, and quite possibly our entire galaxy are either destroyed or under the boot of the Galran Empire. Coran, Father is gone, we may be the last Alteans left in the universe…" For but a moment, her face turned to rage. "...Zarkon."

A chill ran down Shiro's spine, but the other pilots just seemed confused.

"Who's Zarkon," asked Hunk.

"He was the King of the Galra, a twisted creature and an enemy to all free people." Another chill ran down Shiro's spine, and realization struck with it.

"I-I remember now… I was his prisoner…"

 _That_ got the Alteans' attention. "Impossible! Galrans can live twelve hundred years, at most-"

"You _did_ live in a cryopod for ten thousand years," Pidge pointed out.

"That's not… regardless. If he _has_ found a way to survive for ten thousand years, that makes him that much more dangerous," replied Allura as she restrained her emotions.

"He's searching for a superweapon called 'Voltron'," said Shiro.

"He's searching for it because it's the only single weapon capable of defeating him, and that's exactly why _we_ have to find it before he does."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 **Galra fleet command battleship** _ **Londo**_

 **That same time**

The witch Haggar snapped from her meditation as if struck by lightning, a hoarse noise somewhere between a groan, a moan, and a pained exhalation fleeing her lips. Shakily, she stood and turned to the Lord of the Universe, Zarkon, Emperor of the Galra. Ten thousand years had not been kind on either of them, though exercise and Quintessence ensured Emperor Zarkon looked no less powerful than he did when he ascended to the throne, and, well, Haggar was always under that cloak anyway.

"The Blue Lion has returned, and I sense a resurgence of Altean energy."

This came as a surprise to the Emperor, though he adamantly refused to show a hint of it. "Alfor's daughter lives? How?"

"I recall Altean ships above the class of light cruiser in that age were equipped with cryonic healing chambers, perhaps their flagship's were more capable than we thought. But it matters not. She is effectively alone, and now is the perfect time to claim that which is rightfully ours."

Zarkon turned around to face the holographic 'screen' in front of the bridge. The _Londo_ and its sister ship the _Anor_ were newer designs; instead of flat holographic panels they used Galran magitech to project a fully three-dimensional and 360-degree image of the vessel's surroundings on a thin but durable wall surrounding the bridge, which itself was surrounded with so much armor even Voltron would find it difficult to break through.

"Yes… To think that even one survived all these years." His fists clenched, as if remembering a wronging done to him. Perhaps one. Perhaps many. Who could say, as most who had wronged Zarkon personally were either dead or beyond even forgotten. "I shall take back Voltron, and snuff out every last trace of the Alteans. Comms officer!"

"Sire."

"Who is the closest commanding officer to the Blue Lion?"

"That would be… Commodore Sendak, sire."

"Contact him immediately. Tell him to retrieve the Blue Lion and the Altean princess, _alive,_ and bring her to Haggar. In the meantime, have the other fleets continue to scan for activity of the other Lions along their last known trajectories."

"Aye-aye, Sire."

"Helm, maintain course and speed. I have no intention of being late for the surrender of the Galagans."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 **Altean castle-ship** _ **Arcen Leonis**_

 **That same time**

"Princess, you must eat, it's been ten thousand years."

Allura didn't even pause from furiously typing away at the keyboard. "Chronologically. Biologically, it's been three vargas, at most. I'm fine."

"Jesus, I haven't eaten since breakfast and I'm still starving," commented Hunk, somewhat breaking the mood as he stared with vague interest at a pile of odorless green goop that a legally blind person might consider 'food' at first glance. (Though they HAD seen quite a lot of it in the galley on the way to the medical room.)

"You've thrown up like six times since then," pointed out Pidge.

"Ah, right. Not real good when I'm not the one flying." With that, he cautiously reached for the green whatever and gave a few tentative bites. It was exactly as bland as expected, possibly even more, so it was really the texture that caused him to make those faces.

"I can't believe your civilization created such advanced technology ten thousand years ago," said Shiro momentarily before realizing that that was probably a stupid thing to say - Altea wasn't Earth, so who knows how or when they first evolved from hairless apes, or whatever it was that Alteans evolved from. "It must have been an incredible place."

No, wait, _there_ was that emergency-ration aftertaste! Lawn trimmings and subpar beef jerky, plus chalk. How did green gelatinous slime taste chalky? That's the magic of military culinary engineering, baby.

"Yes, it was," said Coran in the same sadprofessional tone he had when he learned how long they'd been frozen for. "But it's gone now - Zarkon made it to the homeworld, and if he got that far into our defenses, I doubt the emergency ark ships could have escaped." Allura wiped a tear as she continued to work and he continued to talk. "In all likelihood, we're the last Alteans in the universe."

Allura let out a small hic of a cry before squeaking drew her attention. In her cryopod, were five mice, each in the colors of the five Lions.

"Maybe we aren't the last Alteans after all…"

The brief shot of happiness into the atmosphere was rudely interrupted by the ship's alarm system.

"What is it now," groaned Hunk through a third of a mouthful of green goop.

"Dunno, but whatever it is, it's probably the FAIP's fault." Keith declined the opportunity to dignify that with a verbal response, instead opting to retort with a not-so-subtle delivery of bird in Lance's direction.

"Be _have_ , kids. What's the time to intercept?" Shiro took command well, and it showed - no mere mortal could get Lance and Keith to stop bickering like an unhealthy couple in divorce court.

"Well, at their present speed, and considering the effective range of Galra fighters… two, three days?"

"Let them come," said Allura as she finally stepped away from the control panel and the two cryopods finally descended. "By the time they get here, you five will have formed Voltron, and we will take the fight back to the Galra." Nods of approval all around, though Pidge's was a bit hesitant.

"That's a plan, all right, but with all due respect ma'am there are five lions. How are we going to find the rest?"

With a determined smile, Allura motioned for them all to follow her. "Come to the bridge and you'll all find out."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The bridge turned out to be just an elevator ride away. Some of the pilots questioned why the ship hadn't just taken them to an elevator and led them to the cryochambers, but well, whatever. It was also much larger, with four black panels - external screens, a la earlier COFFIN designs? - and a massive light fixture above the central captain's station, where Allura now stood, bathed in the blue-white light from the crystal.

"King Alfor connected the Lions to the princess's life force," Coran explained as the glow briefly intensified. "She alone is the key to finding their whereabouts. An effective security measure, as you can tell."

A moment later, and the light vanished, replaced by an explosion of pinpricks of light - some with what could only be Altean letters, some with labels, some with color markings, some with lines connecting them into thousands of constellations.

"These are coordinates… the Black and Red Lions seems like they're already here," said Pidge as she poked the blue dot with a black 'halo' (which itself had a red halo), which expanded to reveal Earth, plus the Blue and Black Lions next to each other, each on labels pointing to an area in the Chopinburg Rainforest. The Red Lion was a bit further away, back where the Galra ship had crashed.

"Well look at your primitive ape brain, figuring things out like a space-faring race," commented Coran before being shot an almost lethal glare from Allura. Looked like she would be having none of that nonsense on board her battlecruiser this day.

"Very observant. That's because the Black Lion is already on board, and the Red Lion was on the Galra ship your military shot down."

With a nod, Coran finished for her, having regained his composure after the severe scolding he had received. "King Alfor locked the Black Lion in the castle to keep Zarkon from getting to it. The doors will only open if all five Lions are present, and it's twice as thick as the hull armor. You'd have to ram a Galra heavy cruiser right into it to put so much as a dent in that door!"

"As you have no doubt noticed," Allura said, waving her hand to shift the star chart to focus on Earth, "the lions choose their pilots. It is a mystical bond that can neither be forced upon nor forcibly undone. The quintessence, some say the soul itself, is mirrored in paladin and lion. Together, they form a sort of dual-consciousness that science alone cannot explain."

"Like stage III COFFIN?" Pidge had been the first to bring up the similarities, but Lance and Hunk had both opened their mouths to say something, so surely they had realized it as well.

"In a way yes, though without the inherent danger your species seems to be struggling with eliminating. Furthermore, even at the closest level of bond, the pilot never loses consciousness." She tapped Earth, expanding the view of the Black Lion.

"The Black Lion is the head and body of Voltron. Its pilot must be a born leader, always in control, able to roll with the punches and whose men willingly follow without question. Shiro, you will pilot the Black Lion."

 _Good day to wear black,_ he thought. Allura waved her hand again, and the map zoomed into a dense, stormy jungle world, upon which a substantially smaller green Lion, even smaller than the Blue Lion, was playfully flying. "The Green Lion is inquisitive, and requires a pilot of intellect and daring; one willing to learn even that which is difficult, and use that knowledge to protect others. Patrick, you will pilot the Green Lion." A wave of her hand, and back to Earth. "The Blue Lion-"

"Lemme guess, the best hotshot pilot, the true player, the real Maverick type?"

"...is the diplomat, and has a forgiving flight style, though by no means is it merely for novices. Yes, Lance, you _will_ pilot the Blue Lion." _Not like I have much choice. Like I just said, you can't break the bond between Paladin and Lion… at least without killing the Paladin. And he's far from the most annoying pilot type I've had to deal with._

"The _Yellow_ lion is caring and kind. Its pilot puts the needs of others above their own, and will strike with unyielding force to defend them. Their heart must be mighty, and their will greater still when it counts. Hunk, you will pilot the Yellow Lion as the leg of Voltron."

"Always wanted to be a leg," Hunk said with a hint of sarcasm, but it was muted under the awe at the size of the lad that was the Yellow Lion. It was second only to the Black Lion in size, and seemed to be napping above a dessicated corpse of a planet. Another wave of Allura's hand, and they were back to Earth.

"The Red Lion is temperamental and unforgiving, and the most difficult to master, but also the most loyal. Its pilot must rely on instinct as well as skill, and they must be willing to trust the lion and let the lion trust them, more so than the others. Keith, you will fly the Red Lion."

Lance let out an annoyed tsk, which got a glare from Keith and Allura, but neither said anything.

"Unfortunately, it seems that the crash landing of the Galra vessel it was on severely damaged the hangar where the Red Lion is held captive, so it will need at least one of the other Lions to dig it out."

"Two days, we've got time I guess," Keith said dismissively. Or disappointedly. Hard to say with Keith at times. He raised an eyebrow as the Red Lion roared in response to him tapping the hologram, and the five lions all flew into a vertical climbing V formation. Just before they would have bumped into the massive crystal in the ceiling, a flash of light hid them, and they formed Voltron, sword in hand.

"Once the Lions are united, they will form Voltron, the most powerful warrior ever known, Defender of the Universe."

"Bitchin'."

"Cool…"

"Kinda looks overdesigned if you ask me…"

Hunk, however, had questions.

"Alright, okay, so we're getting the other lions, got that, now how do the lions, you know, turn into legs and arms and stuff? And how are we getting there, how long is this gonna take? And I really gotta pee. Does the bridge floor have bathrooms?"

Shiro, of course, took charge. He was the Black Paladin now after all, technically.

"We don't have much time, so I'll make this quick. Lance, you take Hunk and go find the Yellow Lion. Pat, you're with me, we'll get the Green Lion. Keith, you stay here, see if you can't contact Galaxy Garrison, tell them we're going to have another fight with the Galra on our hands in the next few days. Get every fighter we can into the air and in the area."

"I'll get the ship defenses ready," said Allea. "We'll need them, even with that railgun battery on this continent you ha-oh."

A notification had popped up in front of her on what was probably the alert screen.

"It seems the diplomats have finally gotten on board. Coran, can you handle getting the defenses readied? I believe I will have to handle this."

"Not a problem, your royal highness. But first, I'll get a shuttle ready for you, Pat, so you can get to the Green Lion. Shouldn't take too long, the shuttles have probably been prepped since the cryopods were activated."

"Okay then," Shiro said. "We all have our plans. Let's do this."

* * *

 **an:** Got it out before July started, so technically within my second planned deadline. Ha. Next chapter may take about as long even if I put my back into it, since IUN/Galaxy Garrison isn't a one-planet government, so there will probably be lots of measuring contests even as they set up relations with the Two People Technically Considered The Altean Kingdoms. Also the worlds the Green and Yellow Lions will be somewhat different from their canon ones. Differentiation ho!


End file.
